Burnin' Down The House...

[Ken]

Ya gotta be careful where you route those wires!

I was fooling around with the Valentine One to try and position the remote display in a slightly different location. This involved me sitting in the passenger seat while I figured it out. (Actually, I wasn't quite sitting in it all the way; just sorta one butt cheek, with my right leg hanging out the door.)

I was leaning far to the driver's side, unknowingly pressing the "recline" button for the seat with my left hip. Well, the seat had moved as far as it was going to move and of course the motor kept struggling to move it some more! And we all know what happens when an "irresistable force meets an immovable object" - the thing heats up! One of the wires was lying on top of the motor and guess what?

Luckily it was all smoke and no fire, but what a lot of smoke there was!! And stink... Whew! The weird thing is the way smoke will travel through the insulation and appear at a completely different area from the short; at one point it appeared as though my fuse box was burning. :eek

Nothing at all seems to have been affected except of course the wiring for the passenger seat. And since I don't sit there, I don't think I'm gonna re-wire it. :L Maybe I'll just get some lightweight racing seats.

 

[78SilvAnniv]

How strange...

Hey Ken,
I'd just read your reply at 3:09pm in Beautiful Vettes Recount about crashing and burning. Then I went to your after 4pm post about Burning Down the House....did your smoking seat wires occur between those two posts?
If it did....are you psychic?

Silver

 

[GreyGhost]

Similiar Experience

Ken:

Your experience reminded me of something that happened to me a while back. While I was working around the car, every once in a while I would hear a faint grunt (aarrrtt). What in the world? I looked around but couldn't find anything. I'd go back to what I was doing....(aarrtt).... still couldn't find what it was. It's like someone was playing a trick on me.... I kept peeking around to see who it was....nothing.....(aarrtt).

When I got into the car the next day the power seat was all the way back and when I tried to start the car the battery was dead.
It turned out the power seat switch went bad and would short the motor a little zap at a time (aarrtt). Charged the battery moved the seat to where I wanted it and disconnected the junction box to the power seat until I could replace the switch.

Funny things happen,
__________
:cool
Al

 

[Ken]

Re: How strange...

...are you psychic?

:L No Heidi, the short in the seat took place the other day. I'm just gettin' around to posting it here.

Originally posted by GreyGhost
Funny things happen.

:L That's a polite way of putting it Al.

Ken

 

[fastglass95]

No Electrical Fires here!

This is a very good reason to use a "Battery Cut-Off Switch" on all cars that sit for any period of time or are collectors / race cars.
I know sometimes you need power when working on them, but not always.

Cheap Insurance! I use them and recommend them for anything that is not a regular driver.

I guess in California, a Vette could be a daily driver I'm not that lucky