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Hey pal my car is the only car toast here on this forum.....

'Cept you can just plop in your K8 and call it a day haha.

You should just do your head gasket(s) and get that car rolling, you should give it a try yourself, maybe get someone local to help you out. I did my first headgasket in december on a v6 mustang and I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was.

I'm considering towing this car to a storage container and then train it to school till february when I get my full license. When I get my full license I'll buy another MX3(theres a blue GS I've been eyeballing for a while) and then driving that as my DD and when it's warmer tow back this car and plop the BPT into it.

I'm pretty sure my harness is fucked so that whole things gonna need to be replaced(not the end of the world as I can just grab one out of a 92-93 RS or 93 Protege. Hell Tav has the harness from the RS I bought in summer I could probably use.


Another option is to accelerate the BP build, get the engien tossed together then source a G series trans and use that for now.

He probably blew a fuse, either the main fuse or the FI fuse. If the harness was destroyed every time someone accidentaly grounded out their battery there'd be a lot more dead cars in the world.

RobMinhas wrote:
I'm pretty sure my harness is fucked so that whole things gonna need to be replaced(not the end of the world as I can just grab one out of a 92-93 RS or 93 Protege. .

I should have complete BP harness that came off my BP (have a 93 rs so used my existing harness) if you cant find one let me know.

[quote="wytbishop"]He probably blew a fuse, either the main fuse or the FI fuse. If the harness was destroyed every time someone accidentaly grounded out their battery there'd be a lot more dead cars in the world.[/quote

It could be, I'll have to check tomorrow with a multimeter.

The reason I think it's toast is mostly because my cousin is a jackass and if it made cool sparks when he touched them theres a very good chance he did it more then once. He just recently took my lighter out of my toolbox and was caught lighting up some old books in the basement, trouble child.


And thanks Jovian, I'll let you know.

Once the main fuse is popped, there's not much that can happen. Power goes from the battery +ve stright to that fuse. No fuse, no go.

Did you ever accidentally touch the rad support with a wrench while disconnecting the Alternator main power? Exactly the same effect as bridging the battery. That's why there's a 100A (80A on the RS???) fuse there.

wytbishop wrote:He probably blew a fuse, either the main fuse or the FI fuse. If the harness was destroyed every time someone accidentaly grounded out their battery there'd be a lot more dead cars in the world.

I had an issue in my mx-3 years ago where I blew the main 100 fuse and the only thing that worked was the headlights. Taillights, dash lights, radio, interior lights, basically anything else electronic didn't work. It would still drive though... I checked the fuse from the top but it was deceiving... it's worth checking them all before replacing your entire harness (like I did - fail )

I also say fuses. If that doesn't fix your issue (say that you get all power back but the car won't start) you'll just need a new engine computer.

On a related note, I was working on my cavalier one day and touched both battery terminal posts together, lost all power to everything. I disconnected the battery, let it sit, then reconnected. It started right up. All I had to do was replace the radio fuse.

Honestly, if your cuz but a wrench on it-it probably hurt. (I've done it a number of times accadently) Anywho, I agree with everyone else......Checking those fuses is a good idea.

wytbishop wrote:Once the main fuse is popped, there's not much that can happen. Power goes from the battery +ve stright to that fuse. No fuse, no go.

Did you ever accidentally touch the rad support with a wrench while disconnecting the Alternator main power? Exactly the same effect as bridging the battery. That's why there's a 100A (80A on the RS???) fuse there.

That's a really good point, I was being all mopey and distraught so I didn't think of that but it would makes sense. And I've got an RS so the alty is pretty far away from teh Rad support so it's never happened to me but that makes sense there.

@Mooneggs, that sounds like a lot of work haha, I didn't try my headlights but I doubt they would;ve worked either, I'll just check all of the fuses.

Savin wrote:I also say fuses. If that doesn't fix your issue (say that you get all power back but the car won't start) you'll just need a new engine computer.

On a related note, I was working on my cavalier one day and touched both battery terminal posts together, lost all power to everything. I disconnected the battery, let it sit, then reconnected. It started right up. All I had to do was replace the radio fuse.

I was thinking about that, B6s are fairly common as far as MX3s go in Calgary so I should be able to source one fairly easy, any way to check if it's gone short of just replacing it?

It's sitting unplugged right now, I'll give it a kick in the morning and see if it starts up then.

AaronTietje wrote:Honestly, if your cuz but a wrench on it-it probably hurt. (I've done it a number of times accadently) Anywho, I agree with everyone else......Checking those fuses is a good idea.

I hope so, god knows that kid needs to be disciplined by something, never thought I'd have to keep my cars hood closed in my own garage.

There might be a way to test the computer, but I personally don't know how. I've never looked into it.

Savin wrote:There might be a way to test the computer, but I personally don't know how. I've never looked into it.

Worst comes to worst I could probably dig up a B6 ECU easily enough.

So this morning I tried to check the main fuse today, figured I'd yank it and then check it inside. So in my vast intelligence I grabbed a hold of it and yanked it out, except I didn't know there were two bolts to be unplugged so I basically destroyed the fuse. I noticed the bolts afterwards and removed the shrapnel from the fuse box but I'm not sure if the fuse was toast or not, I'll have another one tomorrow to try out so I guess I'll find out then.

So Tavis came over yesterday to drop off the harness and help me out, I replaced the main fuse(which had been blown, you guys were all right) and redid a couple grounds(Cylinder head front to passenger side frame ground was lose and neg terminal side/diagnostic box ground was a little corroded too, not much though), fired up the car and we checked the voltage....14.5V! We then plugged in my HIDs and turned them on, voltage dropped down and it was no longer charging :'(

We unplugged the HIDS and tried it again after firing it up, voltage sat around 12v and then started dropping pretty quick, we tried again after unplugging the negative terminal for a bit and no change.

Checked the alternator and the pulley was way too hot, Tav suspects voltage regulator so I'm gonna take a rip down to Autoelectric sometime next week and see if they can test it better then Autovalue does.

Also gonna redo stock grounds and run some new ones, just gotta find a local place that has good prices on thick gauge wiring, think i'll try out Princess Auto since it's pretty close. I was gonna do that while the engine was pulled so it doens't make much of a difference doing it now.

So I charged up the battery separately(bench tested it yesterday and it's fine) and cleaned up another ground(VC to pass side under hood). Switched to stock headlights and it fired up and stayed fine. No multimeter to check but after running fora bout 25 mins(drove and got gas even) and it was fine. I don't trust it enough to try to drive it to school in the shitty weather tomorrow. Not sure what the hell to do about it now but I think I'll source myself a new alternator in the meantime(wanted a new one for the swap anyway).


Anyone got any reccomendations for brands for altys? OR hsould I just get the usual auto value/autozone stuff?

Get a reman, but get it at Canadian Tire. 3 year warranty. I have replaced more than one on warranty there. It sucks that they crap out so much but I had a stock one rebuilt at a very well reputed auto electric shop here a couple years ago and it didn't last any longer.