Well, the saga continues... running lights, however, solved.

The impact broke the wires just behind the tire on the driver's side. Two wires butt spliced and wrapped back together, voila, rear running lamps back.

I still do not, however, have reverse lights. The power to the FUSE is restored with the ignition switch change, but no actual reverse LIGHTS.

I also found, in my wire tracing, a whole bundle of corroded wires that I can't figure out what they are. It looks like some kind of sub-standard shielding was used and it's just disintegrating and the wires behind it are toast. All the wires were bare and wrapped together along its length inside the shielding.

They originate below the fuse box, make an elbow under the battery going towards the firewall encased in a plastic L-shaped housing, come out from that in the one wire bundle that's falling apart, then they go underneath the brake booster, up the firewall, and into the dash, all inside that sheath, a little rubber grommet to the Passenger's side of the brake booster goes around the bundle as it enters the firewall.

This is a picture that shows the general location of where the wire bundle is going into the firewall to the left of the booster, even though it's a different Dodge:

http://www.justanswer.com/chrysler/2...s-working.html


I'm uncertain if those are the grounds for everything in the dash or not. Does anyone know? Need to take a picture of it.

 

Wow! This is quite a read and saga

Lear, I believe there is a connector block for the Primary wire harness behind the lsft front wheel well liner. I unfortunately fried my better laptop that I have my 05 FSM on-----but I feel fairly certain I read somewhere in the wiring diagrams of this connector block----liner comes out easy, may help resolve some issues. Hope this old guys memory hasn't failed me

 

Thanks for the input... wish there was a wiring guru on here somewhere.

I haven't put the liner back in since the wreck, so it's easy to see the wire assembly that's bare and corroded, I just don't know if that's what it is going into the firewall to the left of the brake booster or not... I can't find any technical pictures of that.

I took pictures of it with my camera phone, will link them later from my Photobucket. Looking closer at it, it doesn't "appear" to be directly connected to the fuse box or large battery negative terminals, but that doesn't really mean anything since it goes into this plastic thing I haven't taken off yet. I'll see if I can upload pics tonight.

 

Here is the frayed area I'm talking about, a bunch of wires all bundled together inside a sheathed assembly with a plastic guide piece running through the middle, the exposed piece is to the right.

http://i220.photobucket.com/albums/d...psbec8b2b3.jpg

The 2nd picture shows the plastic piece directly under the battery's positive terminal pointing to the left, it's the wire just behind the red amplifier wire:

http://i220.photobucket.com/albums/d...psda62aa2f.jpg

The 3rd picture shows where that whole wire bundle goes into the firewall to the left of the brake booster in the picture:

http://i220.photobucket.com/albums/d...ps021d1a3b.jpg

 

Guess I'll take it to the dealer today and see if their parts department can tell me what that wire goes to.

Also found these two links, may be a ground wire in that particular wire bundle at the fuse box:

http://www.ramforumz.com/showthread.php?t=92947

http://repairpal.com/replaced-speed-...speedo-odo-451

 

NYE update:

Went to the dealership, they said that wire is the accelerator position wire for the cruise control module.

My cruise control doesn't work because I have no speedo right now (CRUISE ON light comes on, but won't hold speed). When I get the other electrical issues fixed, I'll check this and, according to the mechanic, if it functions, just spray it with WD40 to prevent further corrosion, double wrap it in electrical tape, and drive on down the road.

Tomorrow I'll start checking for a good ground for the harness that is listed in that link in the thread above and will post back.

 

NYD update to those keeping track... sometimes I feel like Tom Hanks talking to "Wilson". *chuckle*

The link I looked at above had a 2005 Ram and evidently the white wire bundle under the fuse box is different, because I had no ground wire in that bundle, only red hots of varying gauges.

In doing some searching, the dealership lied, said that when they replaced the ignition switch that power came back to the fuse. Crapola, no power at the fuse for Reverse lights. There's 3 in a row actually that have no power: ABS control (different than ABS pump), Reverse Lamps, and A/C Panel. All of which of course aren't working in my truck.

I disconnected the ABS module harness plugs while the truck was running, two of them have 12V supply, even with the Fuse out of it at the fuse box. Strange. Not sure why or how that's wired that way.

So I'm back at square 1. Except, I found the loose wire for the radio behind the panel. Radio gets power now, I can set all the stations and the EQ, but can't turn up the volume. When I do, it goes up to 1 or 2 for a SPLIT second, then bounces back to zero volume, no hissing on the speakers. Will run a search for what that means, but certain it's unrelated to the other elect problems.

Don't know if they ran power in series or ground in series to those 3 fuses or what, but I have the same exact problem now with two different fuse boxes, so the problem has to be somewhere in the wiring. Anyone?

 

God reading through all of this I'm not sure I'd have kept up with trying to fix it all.... that just sounds like a huge nightmare.... Honestly I prolly would have purchased entirely new wiring harnesses for the Cab and Engine and just started from scratch. Troubleshooting DC circuits is one of the biggest pains in the @$$.

Do you have a signal toner? That will definitely help you trace out wires in a bundle....and you can find them pretty inexpensive on Amazon...

 

I agree. I have removed the main wiring to fix...

sometimes a signal toner is called "Fox and Hound" a god sent.. for wiring.

 

Well, glad I didn't go that route, because it's not the wire bundle. Today's update... I went on Justask.com and posted a DETAILED problem list asking for an electrical EXPERT on Dodge trucks. The guy I got is decent, having to pull him through the process with me but we're making progress.

He sent me the diagram for how those items get power. Interestingly enough, ALL of the items showing problems, the Transmission Power code that keeps getting thrown even though the transmission shifts great, the ABS, the Reverse Lights, the AC controls, ALL of them get power from the ignition switch sending power back to the fuse box, then the fuse box sends them from their individual fuses out to their components.

So we look for power at C219, the connector in the wire harness close to the floorboard behind the emergency brake under the driver's dash, and there's no power at the circuits that go to the ignition switch. Check continuity from ignition switch to C219 harness, continuity is good, but no power. I'd have thought the dealer would have checked for power when they installed a new ignition switch (I suspect it didn't need one), but evidently not.

So after getting more wiring diagrams from the justask.com electrical mechanic, I go back out to the truck today and get under the fuse box. C2 is the white connector underneath and 4 out of the 5 power leads to C219 connector and then on to the ignition switch come from here. NONE of those 4 wires coming out of the bottom of the fuse box have power. Zero, zilcho, nada.

So now I'm a little confused. I put a known-good fuse box in the truck and it has the same problem. Could it be a ground wire to the fuse box that tells the PCM to switch on those lines? Are those lines supposed to always be hot?

We're now venturing into more than basic wiring diagram and more of the nuts and bolts of how the PCM functions internally in order to troubleshoot. At least I know the wiring harness is fine, it's just not getting power out of the Fuse Box to those lines and components.

Hopefully he has enough information to tell me where the grounds are at. I may have to replace the PCM again and instead of getting a used one, getting one from the dealer (OUCH!) Does anyone know if the PCM can be reset or reprogrammed to help clear some of these issues or if it's either "it works or it doesn't"?

Thanks!