Blown speaker resistance was 0.0 ohms. (I know, it should have been obvious what the reading would be).

 

Ok, so, that's not it..... Wonder if something is shorted underneath...... You know, the place that's hardest to access?

 

This is why electrical issues (i.e. shorts) are the worst problems on vehicles. What is strange to me is that the non-working radio appears to have a bigger current draw than the ASD circuit. If I can get the radio to work, I can use the battery cutoff switch to keep the battery from discharging if needed. Hence the PO's jury rigging.

It would be nice to find out where the short is, but there are limits!

 

Today I decided to try the van radio/cassette/cd player in my pickup to make sure it was still working, since I couldn't get it to work in the van. It checked out. I took the plain jane radio/cassette player out of the pickup and plugged it into the van, and wouldn't you know it, it worked! I can get sound in both left and right front doors. I can live with this arrangement. I will get some speakers from the scrap yard that aren't blown and hopefully this will solve the audio problem.

I'll report back on any improvements in the short.

 

Junkyard speakers now in both doors and the basic stereo is up and running. Yay!

 

A miracle appears to have happened: After replacing the basic radio and speakers, the battery draw disappeared! I measured the amperage at 0.0 mA. I have no explanation! Electrical gremlins at work! I left the battery hooked up over two nights, and the engine cranks just fine. And...I'm not complaining, other than I wish I could give the forum a reason for the short disappearing.

BTW, this van will replace my 1997 Dodge Ram 3500 wagon that I modified to hold a kingsize bed (two twin air mattresses side by side) on a platform, a refrigerator, microwave, 3-drawer file cabinet for storage, and an inverter. It's made many trips up and down the USA. Hopefully the newer van will provide many years of service.

 

That's just bizarre...... I don't have the wiring diagrams available, but, does the radio memory draw power off that circuit as well? Maybe there is an issue with the radio itself that was causing the high draw??

 

I agree it is quite bizarre. Unfortunately I don't have a wiring diagram that shows any ties between the radio and other circuits like the ASD. Don't you just love gremlins?!

So with the battery still hooked up for the last 4 days, the engine turned over just fine! Am I complaining? Heck no!!!

 

Electrical was always my least favorite thing to play with when I was doing it for a living....... Sometimes, the interactions between systems would give you symptoms that pointed in a completely different direction.... so you ended up chasing your tail for several hours..... Had an old escort that ran like crap, and got worse as it warmed up.... After spending two days trying to figure it out, went to the ford dealer to peruse their library. Spent a couple hours reading, going thru the procedures for troubleshooting the problem, only to discover that I had already been thru everything listed in their troubleshooting charts..... Then I find a tiny little note, toward the end of one section, that mentioned it might be some other, completely unrelated part, that could also be the problem. Swapped out the 20 dollar part, and the problem was gone.......

Unfortunately, I couldn't charge the customer 20+ hours chasing an electrical gremlin...... Ended up billing him for 3 hours, and the part. Paycheck that week sucked.

 

I can relate! Fortunately, I'm 'retired'...and I'm doing this for 'fun'! The curse of knowing how to work on machines. We'll see if this latest 'fix' (i.e. the short) holds up once this rig goes on the road. Let's hope so.

BTW, there is more info contained in DodgeForum.com than all the dealer manuals in the world! Thanks to you and all the contributors for their experience.