this started one day a tad over a month ago. i took off from a stoplight and my car died, pulled over, checked fuses and found my underhood 10amp ign fuse was blown. put a new one in, and it promptly blew again before i got 3 blocks away. so i called a tow truck to take it to a shop. the put a circuit breaker in it and sure enough, it blew their circuit breaker a few times. they looked through the wiring and didnt find anything wrong, even went so far to disconnect and and clean all the connections. after that they gave it back to me and after about 60 miles of driving the fuse blew again. so i had it towed back, they replaced the fuse, and didnt have another problem with it. so i go to pick it up, and the fuse blows again, after about 30 miles of driving! have it towed back, they go over the wiring again, still cant find anything wrong, so they stick a new fuse in it, and it still hasnt had another problem. i am afraid to go pick it up because i cant afford to put it in the shop again. anyone know what could possibly be causing this issue? i did a search and it seems that the things to look for are a bad coil, ignition module, and crank position sensor. i do have pacesetter longtubes on, and i had a shop do some welding on the exhaust. how could i go about finding the cause to this issue and get it fixed?

 

Exactly which fuse is blowing in the under hood box? Which fuse #? That way, all you need to do is look at the wiring diagram for a 96, and figure out what's on the circuit.

 

do you have any kind of car alarm hooked up or heavy stereo equipment i had this happen to me before on my 87 camaro where the guy hot wired the car alarm to my ign fuse for some reason and i found out that my brother actually ripped the face off of the alarm in the car i didnt even realize it and the two resistors where constantly touching eachother grounding out the fuse all the time i know it seems far fetched but maybe something similiar to that is happenening to you where something is grounding out whatever is connected to your ign fuse good lucK!

 

Check your ICM ground. Happened to me like last week after $300 worth of diag at an electrical place. Check the ground thats are connected to the coil/ICM bracket. I bet you will find your culpret there.

 

I had the same thing happen to me. It just so happened that i had a short where I just put in the fuse. So I would checkthe wire there under the hood in that black box to see if it is shorting out. I also had the same problem when I had the tranny fluid changed. I noticed a wire got pinched when I put the pan back up and caused a short that was linked to the ignition fuse wire. So start with the easy thing by looking under the hood and really look. I hope that helps.

 

The power feed from the ignition fuse #11 is on a pink wire from the fuse box through the black 10 pin connector located near the PCM and then to the coil, ICM and CKP.

Since the shop didn't replace any parts AND the problem is occuring randomly, it would indicate the problem is a bare spot in the wire occasionally touching ground.

Unfortunately the only fix is a sometimes exhausting search of the wire in question. You could disconnect C100, the black 10 pin connector near the PCM and wiggle the heck out of the pink wire between the fuse box and the connector.

If nothing happens there, you can now do the same thing from the connector to the 3 items listed. In this way it gives you a 1/2 way point to start from.

One last thing, the pink wire you are concerned with is the one on the connector C100 that is second from the end between a brown and a blue wire. The other pink wire that is the last wire on the other end is for the injectors and not on the circuit in question.

If your tired of blowing fuses and have a multimeter that "beeps" for continuity you can do the following instead:
Remove the fuse and find the fuse contact side that does NOT have 12 volts on it. Now put the "beeper" on the fuse contact that did not have 12 volts on it. That is put one of the meter leads on that contact. If it makes it easier, break an old fuse up and clip the meter lead on the old fuse contact and slip it in the fuse socket. Put the other meter lead on a GOOD frame ground. Now when the wire makes contact with ground (like when you wiggle the wire) the meter will "beep".

Good luck to you.

 

UPDATE: i talked to the shop yesterday, they say the water pump is leaking a little bit and the coolant is leaking into the crank position sensor. they didnt want to replace the water pump until they talked to me and verified that this could be the problem. so what does anyone think? would water leaking into the CPS cause this short? i told them to go ahead and replace the sensor and the water pump. i sure hope this fixes the problem.

 

A leaky waterpump is most likely going to cause failure of your opti; get the waterpump fixed ASAP.

 

Hey have that issue of your car the teal green one nice car!!!!

 

Do you have a shift light spliced into the coil wire by any chance? (This happened to me last week and kept blowing the ign fuse)

 

nothing spliced into any wiring. wiring is completely stock, as are all components.

 

I could be wrong but i don't think that would cause the problem. I think if it did blow a fuse it would be the PCM fuse not the ign.

 

i just read this post and it brings me back to a problem i had,pull the fuse box cover off and gently slide the box out look underneath it and you will see an orange wire it may have gotten chafed and is grounging out,may not be your problem but it sure was mine!

 

So any answer to what caused your problem?