Dead Morris following rewire.

[Sarge]

I had to replace my loom following a short circuit caused by a worn wire behind the dash that resulted in a fire a numerous melted and fused wires.
New loom installed, no wires remain homeless, but the car is virtually dead.
I have 12v at the battery, starter solenoid and on both sides of the fuse box, but the only sign of life I can get is the interior light coming on !
Nothing when I try to start it and even items that should work regardless of the ignition are dead i.e. the lights and horn.

Any bright ideas ? Could the voltage regulator be at fault ? How can I check it.

Thanks

[charlie_morris_minor]

as a quick test, you could by pass the regulator to check all the light etc work, if they do, it would seem to point at the regulator. No doubt someone will be along soon with a proper test for the regulator

[mike.perry]

Check the earth straps to the battery and chassis / engine or gearbox

[twincamman]

Check the earth straps to the battery and chassis / engine or gearbox

Sound advice. The best bit of advice anyone gave me was "On old cars, always check the earth", well that and "don't eat yellow snow"!

[bmcecosse]

It's very simple wiring - and very little of it goes throught the 'voltage regulator' - so you must track down what IS a bad connection. Start by tracing the brown wire - and from there get power to the non-fused ignition circuits (white wires) which should at least get the engine running! Then spread to fused ignition circuits - and finally non-fused. Frankly if there is power at 'both sides' of the fuses - then it should be indeed be earthing problems!

[Sarge]

Thanks for the advice, I will go back to tracing earth connections.

That was my initial suspicion and I've checked umpteen times, but once more may help.

[d_harris]

Get the multimeter on the battery first of all... Does it have enough charge!?

[Peetee]

I'm not an expert on electrics but perhaps the battery has twelve volts but not many amps? The interior light need very little 'umph' to light it whereas most other things need a bit of welly to get them going.

[Alec]

Hello Peetee,

have a look at the regulator, there should be two heavy gauge brown\blue wires on A1, one feeds the ignition switch and the second goes to the main lighting switch. (note, nothing to do with the regulator as such, merely where they are connected)
There are two brown wires on A, one is from the solenoid, battery side terminal and provides all the power for the car, the second goes directly to the fuse block, and comes out as purple. As your interior light is working this is probably OK, the other circuit on that fuse is the horns. Do check that you have got a good connection with the fuses in the fuse block itself. The second fuse is ignition fed (white wires), i.e only live with the ignition on.

Go through those circuits first. Earth problems would affect the occasional item but hardly all that you have mentioned.
A low battery would be a problem but if it is at 12 v or so it should be enough to run most circuits.

Alec

[bmcecosse]

There should never be different colour wires on the same terminal. Brown wires join on A - the lights feed (brown/blue) comes from A1 - but this is just to give a slight charge 'boost' when the headlights are on, however the feed to the Ignition switch also comes from A1.But you say you have power on both sides of the fuses ? It will do no harm to join the A and A1 terminals for a test..........

[beero]

The horn works on the same fuse as your interior light so that could be a separate problem.

Sounds like you have 12v at A on the control box (regulator) but not at A1. So could be a control box problem, or the connections.

See link for control box testing / adjusting

http://home.comcast.net/~rhodes/generator.html

[Sarge]

The horn works on the same fuse as your interior light so that could be a separate problem.

Actually the horn is also a problem as I've lsot some of my notes from the initial de-looming. The wires on the new loom don't match the wires on the steering rack.

New and old Loom .............. Cable into steering column
Green/Brown........................Green/Brown
Bright Green...................... Bright Green
2 x Green/white......................Green/White
2 x Green/red......................Green/Red
Purple/Black ......................?
? ...................... Black
? ...................... Brown/Black.

My confusion is that I have 6 coloures coming off the steering rack, but only 5 colours available on the loom.

The car has been off the road nearly a year and it's a classic case of "oh I'll remember where that goes"

[Alec]

Hello sarge,

A1 and A are linked internally within the regulator, it is possible that link has a bad connection or is burnt out?

Regarding the loom, purple black is the earth path for the horns (which are permanently live) so goes to the horn push as should the black ( Earth). Brown black is the earth path (to switches) for the interior lights, so I'm not quite sure what it's doing at the column?

Alec

[Sarge]

Hi Alec,

mmm . Here's a picture.
You can seen the loom wiring coming in from the left and the existing wiring from the steering column coming in from the right. Colours match down to black and brown/black.
I think that the purple black on the loom should go to the black (earth) coming from the rack. ??

[Sarge]

Alec et al
I by-passed the voltage regulator and put A and A1 brown-blue direct to the fuse control box.
Hey presto, lights and power to the ignition. Progress !!

Not started yet, but it's been off the road about a year now, so no suprise there !

[Alec]

Hello sarge,

I don't remember exactly how the horn push is connected. Is there a black coming out of the column at the bottom, or is threre a brass sleeve which has a brush to earth? I would think that the black from the loom will go to the purple\black. It's a whlie since I did any wiring there and my wife's car is no longer standard in that respect anyway. It's worth a try, at worst the horn will blow but probably with that connected the horn button should blow the horn.

Can you see where that brown\black is connected up that sleeve? I was going by the wiring diagram, but it's possible that I missed something else?

Alec

[MarkyB]

The horn is live and you earth it to make it sound.
The opposite to the other circuits.

Hope this helps.

[beero]

Black is always earth so that will go to the body somewhere, not back into the loom.
I would guess the brown/black is a discoloured purple/black so connect them two together.

[moray]

I have just finished rewiring my traveller.
and in doing so I replaced the indicator switch.
and mine as yours has a brown/black wire.

This should be connected to the purple/black in the loom, as it connects to the horn slipring contact on the steering column.
I think the new indicator is a mk1 mini part, and hence the wire colour is wrong.

The black wire is an earth and should be connected as such. My new loom had black wires joined by a double bullet connector where the loom comes through the firewall. I connected the black wire there.

cheers
Moray

[Sarge]

Nearly there with the MM re-wire.
Trouble is I do a bit, get cheesed off, give up for a month or so and then attack again.
After a recent bout of enthusiasm I have got the car started and after re-checking and cleaning earths and other connections I have everything work apart from 1 minor (pardon the pun) component. The horn.

How hard can it be ? As mentioned above, I have a brown-black coming off the steering rack and this connects to the purple-black on the loom. Purple-black and purple connected to the horn.
The black earth cable coming from the steering rack is earthed with the interior light earth.

Interior lights work fine, but every time I press the horn, the 35amp fuse blows.
I have tried earthing in a different place and reversed the wires at the horn end.

I have started using a fuse covered in silver foil when checking the horn as the guy in the local auto-electric shop is begining to wonder what I am doing with all theses fuses !

Could the horn be at fault ? How do I test it ? run 12v across it ?
Any help much appreciated . . on 26 days left on the tax disc.