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98 Grand Am electrical problem - blowing fuses

Last week I reported a problem with a 98 Pontiac Grand Am that is starting to repeat itself. It's a V6 with ~ 115K miles on it.

The problem was as the car was pulling out of a parking lot, the check engine, brake and ABS lights all came on.

After parking the car, shutting it off and restarted it all the lights stayed on and the gear shifter would not move out of park.

The car was towed to a dealer who found a blown ERLS fuse. But they could not determine why the fuse blew.

The car was driven about 50 miles in the last week and ran fine.

Today, the coolant level light came on for a few miles and went out and then came back on. After stopping for gas, the ERLS fuse blew again while pulling out of the station. The fuse was changed but now the check engine light stays on although the car runs fine. The coolant level light is also still on but the level is OK.

Any ideas?

Vinny

Reply to
Vinny
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Let me see if I have this right. "The Dealership" had the car right under their noses, and couldn't determine why the fuse blew.

Go no further.

I've never even seen your vehicle, so how would any of us know what the dealership couldn't determine?

Your job is to find the short in the ERLS circuit, whatever the h*ll that is, and do what someone else was too imcompetent or lazy to do.

Or take it to a shop and get robbed.

Your call.

Lg

Reply to
Lawrence Glickman

..... If it was a hard short, I think the dealer would have found it. It's an intermittent problem. And no I'm not asking for someone to debug the car over the internet, but since it is a very common vehicle, I thought that others may have had a similar problem.

Reply to
Vinny

If it is an intermittent, that should be easy enough to find.

YANK/SHAKE/WIGGLE wire harneses and connectors until you get the fuse to pop again.

Most likely (guessing) it is at a chaffed harnes rubbing against the motor, or a cable burned through at an exaust pipe, or other hot spot like around a cat converter. Just keep shaking and yanking until you blow the fuse. Then you can work that wiring harness until you find the fault.

Lg

Reply to
Lawrence Glickman

I don't recall ever hearing about this specific problem before. Yours may be one of a kind. Possibly, maybe, a recording laptop hooked to the link may see something during the shutdown that could narrow it down. Other than that, I agree with LG: physically look for a bad wire. Look at the schematic and find out what the fuse controls. Try _NOT_ running the a/c and see if that helps. IIRC, erls also controls the a/c clutch.

Reply to
« Paul »

Dealerships dont know much about electrical problems. They have "mechanics" and if they know electricity you just got lucky...

Google for ERLS fuse.

Reply to
dnoyeB

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