My 86 Z is not getting any juice. The battery is fine but I am not getting any power to the lights, starter, etc... Can anyone give me any tips on how to find where the bad ground is???

Thanks

Nick

 

You don't have a short, you have an open. That is, there is either a bad connection, open wire, blown fuse or fusible link somewhere (or a combination of them) that is not allowing current to flow. Check for clean/tight battery connection, good ground wire (off the battery - ) contact to the block, blown fuses, links, etc. A cheap multimeter from Harbor Freight or Radio Shack is very helpful to help track down these kinds of problems.

 

What does a multimeter do and how do you use it??

Nick

 

A multimeter is used to check voltages and resistance, among other things. Cheapo ones (more than enough for auto electrics) use a needle and a scale, although I've heard there are cheap digital ones now. You set it to the right voltage or resistance range, touch the leads on area you want to test, and read the scale to see what it reads.

Example of use: you say battery is good. If you put meter to DC voltage and put black lead on battery - and the red lead on +, you will get about 13 volts. If you then put black lead on good engine block ground, and the other on the big stud on the starter, you should read about the same voltage. If you read more that .2 volt less, you have high resistance in either the ground cable, or the positive cable to starter. Then you disconnect one cable at the battery and put meter on ohms (remove voltage for resistance checks or you will damage meter). Zero the meter (if using analog type), then you put one meter lead on the black cable battery end, the other to a good engine block ground. It should read less than one ohm. More means cable is bad, or it has bad contact at it's gorunding point.

You can use a test lamp for basic checks, but you can't do resistance checks with a test lamp. Resistance checks are good for checking fuses and fusible links.

But check the basics first, cable connections, etc. I only break out my whiz bang Fluke digital multi meter when the basics don't fix the problem.

 

I picked up the multimeter today. Thanks for the help.

Nick