00 Camry electrical gremlins

2000 Camry CE 2.2L 99k miles bought it Saturday from Classic Toyota Tyler TX. Car drove great all day Saturday (of course!). I did notice that the cruise control would not work (see previous post on that subject). But then other things electrical have been happening, and with each one I'm thinking "Oh oh this can't be good".

  1. Dome light has come on a couple of times while driving for no apparent reason.

  1. The "door open" indicator light has remained on once, even though all doors were closed and re-closed.
  2. Driving along listening to radio, hit a bump and the radio stops and the cd starts playing (twice), and once it simply ejected the cd out.
  3. But the strangest "this can't be good" moment was last night. Started up and was backing out of the driveway...son reached to turn on the radio...car died...as son was changing stations, I was reaching for the ignition key...starter engages the engine (on it's own!)and starts the engine back up! All of this happened quickly, maybe over
2-3 seconds...and I was just stunned thinking "what the hell just happened?"
  1. Add the cruise control problem to the list.

I think it's fair to say that I've got some electrical gremlins in there somewhere. Is there a common component (such as a fuse box or the black-box computer)that all of this is wired through where the shorts may be happening?

Reply to
Mike Mason
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Did the starter motor disengage once the engine fired?

Jason

Reply to
Jason James

Is it possible this car had prior flood (water) damage?

Reply to
Daniel M. Dreifus

Yes!! I'm telling ya, it cranked and disengaged on it's own! Right out of the Twilight Zone!

Reply to
Mike Mason

In news: snipped-for-privacy@posting.google.com, Mike Mason being of bellicose mind posted:

Quite a few GMs and Mercedes (probably more) have a this "feature." Let go of the START position too soon.... the ECM will keep cranking for up to 10 seconds to start the engine. Reasoning is heat soak with oxygenated fuels would make a hot engine harder to start. Also, when the engine became cold, a hard start condition would occur due to air developing at the injectors during cool down. On the other end, the same system prevents you from keeping the starter engaged after the ECM senses the engine is turning faster than the starter can turn it.

Reply to
Philip®

How do find that out?

Reply to
Mike Mason

Any very bright lights or flying objects nearby when this happened?

Reply to
Derek

Phil has answered the starter oddity. The radio-player malfuctions sound like a faulty connection in the 12v to the unit which makes and breaks as the car vibrates. One courtesy light switch may be loose causing an earth from the body to get onto it. Just open each door and manually operate each switch, paying attention for intermittant operation of the kind you experienced.

Jason

Reply to
Jason James

You mean besides I think I saw Michael Jackson crouched on top of the car crossing wires and making sparks fly?...no nothing out the ordinary.

Reply to
Mike Mason

Try

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. I seem to remember their report indicates whether a car (i.e., a VIN) has had a major water damage insurance claim.

Reply to
William W. Plummer

Reply to
Gary Danaher

I had similar problems with the cruise control dropping out and with the electric door locks operating spontaneously. It turned out to be corroded pins in the connector between the driver's door and the dash board. And my starter fails to turn over occasionally but this is cured by setting off the LoJack for some reason. There is still one wire that needs fixed to bypass the connector and I'm hoping that will improve the situation.

I suggest you look carefully at every connector. Take them appart and put them back together, looking for corrosion. As the other poster suggested ground straps need cleaned or replaced even if they appear OK.

Reply to
William W. Plummer

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