Hi Everybody,
My 2001 ACR has been having electrical issues.
The story started when I noticed my car would lose all (Engine/instrumentation/clock/alarm/signals/lights) power when coming to stops at intersections/stopsigns. The power would cut out and the engine would die. By the time the engine had died, the power would instantly come back (the instrument lamps would go through their startup sequence and the stereo clock would have reset to 12) and I could restart the engine and drive away until the next occurrence.
I washed the car a couple weekends ago and when I tried to start it the battery had lost it's charge and the starter would barely crank and the car wouldn't start. Here's where things get interesting. I attempted to jumpstart the car from two separate other vehicles. Again, the starter would barely crank the engine (not enough to actually start). I tested the starter relay and discovered it was bad. I suspected that a faulty relay had discharged the battery, so I hooked the battery up to the trickle charger overnight and went to find a replacement relay. The next day after replacing the starter relay, the car would jumpstart fine, but the original battery wouldn't hold a charge. I wrote off the battery and replaced it with a new one and the car started normally. Hooray.
Fast forward to last weekend, while driving I noticed the instrumentation/warning lamps/dome lights would flicker sporadically like a bad contact was being jiggled and the car would momentarily lose power (engine would miss and buck, clock/instrumentation would flicker and reset, spedo/tach would zero, then come back). I was able to reproduce this at idle a few times before the entire electrical system failed and I completely and permanently lost power.
I was wondering if anybody has experienced anything similar. The battery is brand new and I checked the terminals and ground points for any play and found no issue. What could this possibly be?
-Justin
My 2001 ACR has been having electrical issues.
The story started when I noticed my car would lose all (Engine/instrumentation/clock/alarm/signals/lights) power when coming to stops at intersections/stopsigns. The power would cut out and the engine would die. By the time the engine had died, the power would instantly come back (the instrument lamps would go through their startup sequence and the stereo clock would have reset to 12) and I could restart the engine and drive away until the next occurrence.
I washed the car a couple weekends ago and when I tried to start it the battery had lost it's charge and the starter would barely crank and the car wouldn't start. Here's where things get interesting. I attempted to jumpstart the car from two separate other vehicles. Again, the starter would barely crank the engine (not enough to actually start). I tested the starter relay and discovered it was bad. I suspected that a faulty relay had discharged the battery, so I hooked the battery up to the trickle charger overnight and went to find a replacement relay. The next day after replacing the starter relay, the car would jumpstart fine, but the original battery wouldn't hold a charge. I wrote off the battery and replaced it with a new one and the car started normally. Hooray.
Fast forward to last weekend, while driving I noticed the instrumentation/warning lamps/dome lights would flicker sporadically like a bad contact was being jiggled and the car would momentarily lose power (engine would miss and buck, clock/instrumentation would flicker and reset, spedo/tach would zero, then come back). I was able to reproduce this at idle a few times before the entire electrical system failed and I completely and permanently lost power.
I was wondering if anybody has experienced anything similar. The battery is brand new and I checked the terminals and ground points for any play and found no issue. What could this possibly be?
-Justin
