legacycentral bbs

Alright 1992 leggy SS Heres the deal. The guy I bought it off of wired the starter up to the rear defrost so in order for the car to start the button needs to be pushed in which was kinda cool....untill now. My car is currently sitting at the bank because the f&ckin thing has no power to the defrost (no light) and therefore nothing to the starter. I replaced the 20a fuse under the dash and still have nothing. Any ideas? I just walked half an hour home in the rain and am in a rather poopy mood. Is there another fuse that may be the culprit? Help!!!!

just no defrost light or no lights at all? maybe try to jump the sylanoid with it pushed in. that might over ride it. un hook the battery maybe reset. or tap on it maybe somthing tripped in the button. or the button is shot. was the fuse popped? thats a bummer. good luck.

There's the big question of how the previous owner made that wiring modification. There are way more "wrong" ways to do it than "right" ways.

However, we can try to just diagnose why pressing the rear defrost button doesn't turn on the light on the button. The most obvious guess for me would be the relay. That's especially likely if the guy didn't really know what he was doing and was forcing that relay to carry much more current than it's rated for.

There are three relays at the top of the fuse box under the dash. I'm talking about the rectangular plastic ones actually in the fuse box (there are several other relays in the area). They're a little hard to get to; they're above the various wiring harness connectors on the fusebox. The leftmost one is the defroster relay. The middle one is the parking lights relay and the rightmost one is the fan relay.

I'm pretty sure all three of these relays are the same, so you could try swapping them around to see if it makes the problem go away.

Also, just to get your car home, you can jump the starter solenoid directly. Get couple of meters of some wire, 14-gauge or so. Crimp a 1/4" quick-disconnect on one end. Bring it with you to the bank. Unclip the small wire from the starter solenoid and put your wire in its place. Turn the ignition on, and carefully touch the other end of the wire to the battery's positive terminal. That should start the engine. Then you can do the rest of the troubleshooting at home.

Thanks for all the help guys! I went back and while I was upside down in the front seat checking the fuses I found a little switch tucked up under the dash...flicked it and she fired right up.. :l My rear defrost no longer works but at least it runs!!

good luck!

If you want to get the defrost switch working again, you'll probably need to replace the bulb in it. That bulb acts in series with the circuit to keep the switch on, triggering the relay. You can get new bulbs at Radioshack.