OBD II harness losing connectivity

[landcruiser3DP]

anyone have any experience with this? mine keeps losing connectivity and the gauge drops off and has to rescan.

i don’t think i tugged on anything to plug it in but anything is possible i guess.

right now if i manipulate two of the wires (either of the two on the left really) at the engine side of the connector it will lose connectivity. and then if i move them again it will regain connectivity.

anyone know a good way to get back behind the fuse panel? i removed the three bolts but it seems like it won’t come out.

anyone know what that blue shrink wrap is with the little end of bare wire poking through?

it’s a dumb but annoying issue i’d like to fix.

i do have one of those connector shiv deals from wits end. should i unhook the gauge and poke out a wire and it’s crimp and then reinsert them one at a time?

/thanks/ for any help.

 

[surfpig]

I did have the same problem two years ago. I thought it was the scangauge itself for quite a while, until the smog nazis told me they couldn't get a connection to do the testing/diagnostics checks. They did get it to work eventually...

What I ended up doing was to thoroughly clean and straighten all the terminals and make sure they were all nice and tight. I haven't had the problem since.

 

[landcruiser3DP]

I did have the same problem two years ago. I thought it was the scangauge itself for quite a while, until the smog nazis told me they couldn't get a connection to do the testing/diagnostics checks. They did get it to work eventually...

What I ended up doing was to thoroughly clean and straighten all the terminals and make sure they were all nice and tight. I haven't had the problem since.

thanks a lot. does that mean i pop the wires with their crimps out of the harness one by one and sand them down gently and pop them back in with a little dielectric grease? i guess i haven’t messed much with terminals and crimped end wires yet...

 

[surfpig]

thanks a lot. does that mean i pop the wires with their crimps out of the harness one by one and sand them down gently and pop them back in with a little dielectric grease? i guess i haven’t messed much with terminals and crimped end wires yet...

I just cleaned them up a bit with a Qtip and some denatured alcohol and made sure they were all straight and snug. I would try that first.

 

[landcruiser3DP]

I just cleaned them up a bit with a Qtip and some denatured alcohol and made sure they were all straight and snug. I would try that first.

thanks a lot surfpig!

 

[Tools R Us]

...
anyone know what that blue shrink wrap is with the little end of bare wire poking through? ...

That is coax, shielded wire, the outer part is grounded.

 

[landcruiser3DP]

That is coax, shielded wire, the outer part is grounded.

thanks. interesting. can i ask if you can see the bare wire at the end of the blue shrink wrap? seemed non-OEM but maybe it is OEM?
should i clean the terminal end on that one as well i guess? i really don’t want to like our anything that is going to need reassembly to poke back in. dumb question but...

 

[Tools R Us]

thanks. interesting. can i ask if you can see the bare wire at the end of the blue shrink wrap? seemed non-OEM but maybe it is OEM?
should i clean the terminal end on that one as well i guess? i really don’t want to like our anything that is going to need reassembly to poke back in. dumb question but...

It's factory, if you trace it to the other end the outer shield is grounded, it's there to reduce interference.

 

[ToyotaDon]

You've got some good answers here, but I wanted to clarify one thing. The terminals need to be tight, as in the female part which is inside your DLC should grip the male terminals of whatever scangauge or scan tool you plug in. It's more evident when you have one out and looking at it, but basically a small dental pick can be used to re-tension the terminals by bending the U-shaped part upward slightly.

 

[landcruiser3DP]

You've got some good answers here, but I wanted to clarify one thing. The terminals need to be tight, as in the female part which is inside your DLC should grip the male terminals of whatever scangauge or scan tool you plug in. It's more evident when you have one out and looking at it, but basically a small dental pick can be used to re-tension the terminals by bending the U-shaped part upward slightly.

thanks TD. i thought of that after cleaning things up and putting some dielectric grease in there. i’ll post pics. but if anyone is doing this i would do as you indicated and bend the “acceptor tabs” down a bit. my contacts were all quite clean so i suspect they got bent out of shape as you indicate.

 

[landcruiser3DP]

BIG thanks to everyone here!

i marked where the connectors were just to not forget after i took the first one out. it’s not obvious where they go.

i also put a pic at the end of the male side of the gauge just for completeness.

i’m sure there is a better way to get the crimps out since i seemed to do all four a different way.

free advert for the wits end “shiv” here as well. that worked nicely.

 

[landcruiser3DP]

more pics. earlier ones are a bit out of order for some reason...