superdork

fantastic electrical technology... who thought to connect the seatbelts in this car to the ignition???? ok, so the small story is:
the car will only start by being bumped, and the seatbelt light stays on the whole time. i come to find out, that some GENIUS when manufacturing this car decided to make the ignition inactive if the seatbelts are not connected. so somehow, the ground is bad, the seatbelt wiring is bad, the relay(?) is bad, im not really sure what.

has anyone disconnected or bypassed this system before? or know how i could? it seems not worth the trouble to try and trace out the bad wiring....i dont really need my car not to run if the seatbelts arent plugged in.

boschmann

It's been a long time, but I know you can bypass the system at the relay. It's in position 8 on most rabbits, the double-wide relay. Again I can't remember offhand how we used to do it, but it was a fairly basic jumping of the relay connections to bypass it. I think there is a diagram of the relay's connections printed on the relay itself. If you are familiar with wiring you should be able to figure it out.

superdork

thanks for the reply.
would a 1979 have the same wiring as a 1977, or a 1978 custom? very confused by all of this. where would the 8th position be? i see the relay on the schematics, but how that translates to a location on the fuse box i dont understand.

boschmann

The easiest way to identify it is the relay is a double wide unit.

superdork

oh so simple once i got back out there and started poking around. schematics get overwhelming if you dont know how to read them...
i found the relay, got a jinxed feeling about opening it up and decided to try tracing the wires first. turns out, someone had already cut them at the door hinges, and the bit of wire had been pulled inside somehow and been sitting under my floormat, only to come apart whilst driving and stepping on it. stupid people. they didnt tape the wires together, put one of those plastic deweys on them or anything. just twisted em together.
so i thought, hmmm.....(devilish grin).....theft protection?
hook these wires up to a switch, install it underneath the dash...no switch no start. muuuahahaaa. good for folks like me who leave their keys in the ignition.

so now on to figuring out why the crap the glow plug light is crossed with the blinkers...when the plugs are cold, the blinker light is lit, and when they warm, that light goes out and the oil light comes on. any suggestions?

boschmann

The most common cause of that type of electrical gremlin in your car is corrosion on the contact pins on the backside connectors of the fuse box.

superdork

thanks, ill check it out.
i appreciate your help.