65cherrybomb
Jan 10th, 10, 2:10 AM
Rewiring a 65 Chevelle after sever fire and water damage. I gutted all wiring under the dash and motor compartment. Bought a new wiring harness. Thought I plugged in everything in the correct places. Connected the battery went to turn the key and the engine immediately tried to turn over. Eventually smoke started to rising from under the dash. Disconnected the battery and it’s been setting since. I’m thinking it might be the ignition it was never replaced maybe there is a sort in it. Any suggestions on where to begin trouble shooting…. thanks for any & all help
1969 El Camino Dan
Jan 10th, 10, 2:23 AM
That would be depressing, no doubt!
I'd sure take a look at the ignition switch. It should only send power to the starter when in the full clockwise spring release position.
Should be a purple wire.
Pull the switch, unplug it and then reinstall the battery. If everything looks & smells OK, then try jumping from the larger red wire of the switch plug to only the purple wire. That should kick in the starter.
New or a good used switch is not much money.
Good luck!
Dan
Matty B
Jan 13th, 10, 10:51 PM
Get a test light and place it between the negative battery post and the negative cable. With everything turned off that light should be out. If its on you need to start pulling fuses and then components till it goes out.
If the car tried to turn over you have a bad ignition switch, a shorted start lead, or the battery cable at the starter is touching the start post on the starter solenoid. If you saw smoke you are probably experiencing what cause the fire to begin with and thats very bad.
PM me and Ill see what I can do to walk you through it, I do this for a living and could probably diagnose it for you in less than 10 minutes but being away from the car its a bit harder. If you can perform the tasks I ask you to check I can get you to the bottom of it fairly quickly.
Also if you post some pics I can edit them to show you spots to check. Thankfully a 65 chevelle is about as easy as it gets as far as wiring is concerned especially if you have new harnesses in the car.
PS make sure that the ignition switch bezel is screwed down enough, if its not it can cause the key cylinder to hang up in any position including the start position.