John,

I probably have what you need. Let me know. I can bring it to our upcoming
meeting with Joel.

Jim

On Mon, Aug 22, 2011 at 4:05 PM, Scott Daniel - Turbovans <
scottdaniel@turbovans.com> wrote:

> that high voltage warning on that box ..
> refers to the nearby coil.
> there is no 'high voltage' in the relay box there. Nothing over 12 volts.
>
> I have, exactly once, in literally thousands of vanagons worked on ..
> seen a relay short internally , leading to melted wires.
> very rare though.
> the particular time I saw was in an early vanagon in the dash area..
> but no kidding....the ground contact inside the relay somehow reached
> ignition on power ..and all the wires on that circuit started to melt.
>
> looks like you'll be digging until the ruined stuff is all identified and
> removed.
> The nice way from that point is get the whole harness out of a dead vanagon
> ..
> and built that in.
> and you'll get to learn a lot about how it's wired in the process.
>
> likely causes..
> always ..........a wire running on something, or something rubbing, with
> engine vibration, on a wire that is hot while running.
> as for components....relays are suspect for sure, but they are extremely
> ...extremely reliable and long-liffed usually.
> usually it's that someone routed a wire incorrectly, or did bogus work of
> some sort.
>
> Scott
> www.turbovans.com
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "John Rodgers" <inua@CHARTER.NET>
> To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
> Sent: Monday, August 22, 2011 1:21 PM
> Subject: Electrical Fire in the Engine Bay
>
>
>   Well, if it's not one thing, it's another.
>>
>> I was tooling down the road, enjoying my newly opertional air
>> conditioning, and my smooth running engine, when of a sudden - the
>> engine just quit. I immediately put it in neutral, turned off the AC,
>> recycled the ignition switch, but nothing happened. None of the panel
>> lights came on. It was like the battery had been disconnected or
>> something. I left it out of gear and pulled to a stop off the road. Then
>> I realized that with the ignition off, the engine was still running,
>> rough, but still running. I jumped out, popped the hatch, and smoke was
>> everywhere. Engine was kicking over, but barely, and roughly. I pulled
>> the coil wire out of the distributor cap and the engine stopped. At that
>> point I saw a wiring harness that had really gotten hot and melted the
>> insulation.
>>
>> The wires in question came from the high voltage electronics box on the
>> left side of the engine bay that has the two relays in it. The
>> insulation was melted and fused on the wires on the relay marked 53
>> PN#141 951 2538 and PN# 321919505A. From there, the wiring cover - the
>> long flexible plastic cover through which all those wires go, was melted
>> along the bottom, all the way from the ignition box across the front
>> (towards the front of the van) over to the the point it disappears down
>> and behind air filter box and AFM. I moved the wire harness where it
>> passes over the top of the box with vacuum line layout, and got a click
>> over where the starter is. Sounded like the solenoid clicking. I
>> immediately went and disconnected the battery. Got AAA to come and get
>> the van and take it home. That is as far as I have gotten. I'll spend a
>> bit more time later today when it cools off. I have no idea what may
>> have cause this, but to be sure - it will take some time to trouble
>> shoot and fix.
>>
>> I haven't yet started tearing it apart to troubleshoot and fix this.
>> Haven't even looked at Bentley yet.
>>
>> But has anyone any ideas??
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> John
>>
>> --
>> John Rodgers
>> Clayartist and Moldmaker
>> 88'GL VW Bus Driver
>> Chelsea, AL
>> Http://www.moldhaus.com
>>
>