It's a well designed swirl chamber ;o)
And I timed it myself.
I now call the car 'Sherbet' after I spent hours sniffing the exhaust fumes mindful of the days when I was younger and used to mix citric acid with bicarb and icing sugar...
-- Billy H
that's my quest...
I'm going to have to think about the reason why this is true, I'll give it a go though.
First thought is a difference between two negatives.
Electricity is strange, that wouldn't surprise me!
That's fair enough :o)
-- Billy H
No, but what the OP has got is two circuits not working, each of which depends on a feed from the ignition switch. The possibility of a faulty earth connection has been raised, but the OP has bridged the relay and made the glow plugs work, so the earth is unlikely to be the problem. Also, if the earth was the problem, I would expect at least a clunk from the starter. As I understand it, there's not even that. I still suspect the ignition switch or the wires coming out of it to the non-functioning components.
Steve
Not with a busbar they're not.
Steve
This is 'real world' electrics, not nice clean school/college/book electrics.
All sorts of things don't have 'ideal' characteristics, you can't choose to ignore inductance or put unlimited current through a zero resistance wire, that sort of thing.
What happened to my Nova (blush) a long time ago when I had Earth strap troubles is this:
The contact surfaces get corroded and make a poor electrical connection
A poor electrical connection has noticeable resistance
Pass a current through a resistor and you get a voltage across it proportional to the current.
The rest of the circuit has the rest of the voltage available to drop across the rest of the effective resistance.
So if you pass a small current, you drop a small voltage across the earth strap, lots of voltage available at other places, things work.
If you pass an OMFG current then you drop a large voltage across the poor connection leaving a low voltage available for the rest of the circuit. Things don't work.
And as a side effect if you put a high resistance tester (e.g. a multimeter or a lit bulb) either end of your poor connection, it will show the highish voltage being developed across it.
If you put a low resistance across the poor connection, the huge current will try to flow through it instead and the outcome depends on how big the low resistance connector 'wire' is.
For example, if it's only the outer casing of the clutch cable that bridges from the engine block to the body, it can weld it solid or set it on fire. Which is fun.
When I fit a functioning relay I'll get back to you all, but I am baffled as to how this little poxy thing may power both the glow plugs and the starter motor.
I blew a 60A fuse shorting my ignition switch, I suppose the 80A fuse is for my starter.
The relays I've seen on the web are rated at 70A. There is no step down transformer and no coil. (It continues to baffle me how the house doesn't blow up with all that power available...)
It has some hefty (I wouldn't call it f*ck off hefty) metal in it.
Simply, the coil in there is not energising the electro-magnetic radiation needed to draw down the bridge.
I remain baffled as to how it powers both the glow plugs and the starter motor AND starter motor solenoid (maybe it doesn't).
At the present time the starter motor and solenoid do not pass wind, not even quietly.
-- Billy H
It is series connection, whether it is strictly a bus bar or not I cannot be sure of.
-- Billy H
It doesn't. The glow plugs are/should be energised when you turn on the ignition. The starter isn't energised until you turn to start.
No. The starter has a direct feed from the battery, it's the heaviest current ever used on the vehicle. It is not fused. The feed from the switch only operates the solenoid.
It doesn't.
I still suspect there is no feed from the ignition switch. Get a test lamp, earth one side of it, put the other side to the relay terminals one at a time, and one of them should make the test lamp light when the ignition is turned on. Likewise with the starter solenoid, but obviously it won't make that light up until you turn to start.
Steve
The message from "Billy H" contains these words:
How the hell would you do that? Each one would have to have an insulated body and an insulated hole into which to screw.
I reckon you mean they're daisy-chained - links from one plug to the next. They're in parallel.
hey hey, that's why I was born with two feet as well as hands :o)
I'll give it a go tomorrow.
-- Billy H
It appears I can't get hold of a person in this newsgroup who has had a GP relay conk out on them, I'm not sure what that says for Ford relays but...
it baffles me... roll on the scrappies...
One input, long wire, each plug branching from the same wire.
I'd call that erm, oh s**te, I'd call it parallell *big blush*
they aint sniffing each other's arses...
Mate, are you trolling or what? There is next to no chance your problems are caused just by a faulty glowplug relay, so getting a replacement relay will leave you exactly where you started, I'd wager money on it.
it's a problem with the motor, I aint trolling, the f*ckin' relay aint firing but it's got power going to it.
and it all happened at once.
oh sheets, me first forage into this group and I've ballsed it up. My apologies. I'll plug away, no pun intended.
-- Billy H
They are just there to stop wiring going up in smoke if any of the cables from the battery (not starter feed) short to chassis. Not intended to protect any electrical systems, just prevent a fire.
-- bucket
Impossible. They must be in parallel. Apart from anything else, they would have to run on a quarter of the voltage each if in series (4cyl). Series means daisy chaining like this. Pos---------- Neg
-- bucket
It's more like this...
pos-----+--------+--------+--------+ plug plug plug plug
and of course the plughs are earted throught their housings.
There is no neg connection.
It's parallel. An input of +12V on the bus bar rail relative the 0V chassis (engine) and each plug hooked to the rail and the engine so a 12V PD across each one.
-- Billy H
Alternator warning light comes on, from the Haynes manual only earth I see on that is through alternator, so alternator earthed.
Starter and plugs on separate earths, so wouldn't suspect both at once. haha, unless tyhe gremlin's grown bigger teeth...
Relay works, I took it out and tested the windings with a lamp through a 12 volt power pack, so that's okay.
Battery earth strap seems good to refix; if it went I wouldn't get charge through starter although my rocker cover bolts are lighting my lamp when the other end is connected to the + terminal on the battery. It seems a bit odd why my relay don't fire if the headlights'll work. Nonetheless I'll clean that battery earth up.
... and keep studying the book...
-- Billy H
Could be the earth coming out of the relay, but glow plug warning light is working so I don't think it is that. Also, the starter is on a separate circuit, all of it's own.
Well, I got teh bitch going!
It aint an earthing problem, the relay and the solenoid on the starter are a-okay.
Trouble is I don't know what the problem was :o(
I took a lead direct off the positive terminal on my battery and hooked it onto the cap on the fuel cut off solenoid.
I heard the relay click so thought to give it a whirl. Yup she starts first time.
SO I reckon, being twelve years old and I can't be arsed with electric too much (I'll have a look around somemore of course), I'll take two metres of cable, crimp one end onto the fuel cut off solenoid, hook the other to the battery, pass the middle into the cabin and snip the wire, bear some ends and twist 'em together each time I want to use th car. If I feel posh I think maybe I'll fit a little switch.
Any concerns?
It aint goona stop if I got the cable on the fuel cut off solenoid... and as was pointed out, I have a nice 80A fuse next to my battery... and a good pair of legs.
:o)
This reminds me of the way my father used to start his flat back Bedfor back in the eighties, it wouldn't turn off with the key, he had to pull the wires apart. Kept him going for years.
-- Billy H If it aint broke, then why not?
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