NEED REAL TIME HELP!!! Car Wont Start, No POWER! (1 Viewer)

[FloridaFJ80]

So i pull in to work coming back from lunch 20 minutes ago.. shut off my car and then i have a dead car.. NO POWER!!!!! no door open light, no beeping noise, NOTHING... Opened the hood looked at battery and nothing is disconnected , moved around the battery, and i finally heard my beeping noise (key in ignition, door open). went back to try to start, turn the key over, all lights turn off.
So i go back and fiddle again with my battery terminals, and the sounds come back on but it goes away... What could it be?? Do I have a short somewhere???

 

[PHBeerman]

Maybe a short. Did you scrape the batt terminals?

 

[MoJ]

So i pull in to work coming back from lunch 20 minutes ago.. shut off my car and then i have a dead car.. NO POWER!!!!! no door open light, no beeping noise, NOTHING... Opened the hood looked at battery and nothing is disconnected , moved around the battery, and i finally heard my beeping noise (key in ignition, door open). went back to try to start, turn the key over, all lights turn off.
So i go back and fiddle again with my battery terminals, and the sounds come back on but it goes away... What could it be?? Do I have a short somewhere???

91-92? or 93-97?

 

[NorCalDoug]

old battery?
sometimes they just go kaput with no warning.

 

[Tools R Us]

Bad connection or fuse, fusible link, clean the battery terminals and check the links.

 

[firetruck41]

Some ideas: dead battery, badly corroded cables, fusible links...

 

[FloridaFJ80]

its a 92 80.. Negative terminals have the usual battery debris on them. I did notice one of the small gauge wires connecting to the postive terminal is showing some wire. its scraping with the plastic battery sidewall. I have been having problems with this battery, it dies if you leave the door open or play the radio for 10 minutes and stuff like that..I know i need a new battery, but i need a quick fix so i can get home from work, commute is about 45 minutes. also a few days ago, i was stuck in traffic and the car just shut off, but i still had power.. so turned it on again and it didnt do anything else..

lately i have been seeing my oil pressure drop a little below the first line on that gauge. it will idle at 600, and it will idle rough. alot of vibration.. mileage on it is at 265k. this happens after driving it a little while, but not when i first turn it on and drive..

 

[Boston Mangler]

I am willing to be (no $ of course) that you have a bad ground!

 

[aamiggia]

If you have jumper cables or can score some from someone you work with. Connect them from a good car to yours. You don't have to have the other car running.

If your lights come on and beeps, try jiggling the terminals (mainly the (-)). If the power stays on, then your battery is toast.

If the lights come on and beeps only after you jiggle the terminals, then you have a bad connection (ground) not a bad battery.

Try tightening the connectors to the battery terminals. On another car I had a corroded negative terminal that was not tight to the connector. It would cause interminent power outages until I tightened it.

 

[aamiggia]

One more thing.

The car dieing while idling could be a sign of a loose connection. When you driving the altenator provides power, but if you require more power than it can produce the battery is used. If you have a loose connectoin the battery is disconnected, which is probably is due to vibrations from the engine.

At idle the altenator is not spinning fast enough to produce the required power and with no batteyr backup, you may not have enough power to spark.

Does this happen when you have the AC, stereo, and lights on? You may also have a high parasitic (draw) load on the battery from corroded connections. This will increase the current draw from the charging system.

Man, I love those Toyota Service Tech training manuals.

 

[OZCAL]

I am willing to be (no $ of course) that you have a bad ground!

Kevin can you (or can someone else) tell me specifically what to look for or ask the mechanic what to look for regarding a bad ground?

I'm in a similar situation as Florida FJ80 was. A few times over the last few weeks I have turned the key and no power whatsoever. No ignition, no dash lights or anything. Transmission is in park, brake is on. Then, a few minutes and a couple of whacks of the dash later, power is back ignition works. Sometimes the engine revs up/down in that "reset" it does when power has been lost to the computer for a while. Not always. Sometimes I hear a funny electrical/mechanical whirr from behind the dash.

I'm going to clean my (probably) dirty battery terminals, but I'm wondering what the bad ground means?

Thanks,

David

 

[FloridaFJ80]

If I remember correctly, I had a short on one of the two wire harnesses that go on the positve battery side. I just went ahead and inspected all the wiring conections and i found that one wire was sliced, so i went ahead and taped all over them with electrical tape and it seemed to have worked. All terminals were tight to begin with so I would check you wiring.

 

[landtank]

Kevin can you (or can someone else) tell me specifically what to look for or ask the mechanic what to look for regarding a bad ground?

Saying it has a bad ground is nothing more than saying you have a connection problem, only it's specific to the ground side of the system. So clean the ends of the wires where they contact the ground plane such as the frame, engine and battery.

You can get a generic ground cable for these trucks at most any part store for less than 20.00 and it takes only a few minutes to replace.

I worked with one member on his 92 with power issues and that ground cable solved half of them, the positive cable gotten at the dealer took care of the rest.

For the dead truck, try jumping it. If it starts then drive to you preferred battery vedor and purchase a battery.

 

[OZCAL]

Thanks guys I'll get into it and report back. Gotta get a warm refrigerator cold today too frown: ) yeesh.