engine does not rotate, dash gages dance

I have a 97 grand am gt and recentky decided to try putting an aftermarket stereo in it, and after doing this, my dash backlighting did not work even though everything else did. I put in the old stereo again, and still no dash lights-all fuses are good.

Yesterday I took out the stereo and tried to check the wires to see if any where crossed, and at the same time I added speakers to the back. Now the freakin' thing wont even start. My idiot lights will flicker when the key is in the "on" position and there is a clicking sound from around the fuse area. The engine will not rotate at all. Last night the grey wire touched the orange wire in the stereo area and lit up the dash lights then blew the fuse. I replaced the fuses and checked them all today again.

Can anyone help or tell me where to get wiring diagrams? I need my car for school and will never touch anything electrical ever again if I can get this fixed.

Oh yeah, I have tried autozone's website and they dont have what I need.

thanks

sound like a short-n-something. what power source did you tap into? A wire or into the fuse panel?

If the zone dont hav the wiring diagram you'll probley hav to buy a manual for you car, or at least try to look at one to see if it has the diagram in the back that you need. Or a library oooh i said the L word.

only other thing is to hook it all back up the exact way it was, and not with twisted/taped leads. Oh one more thing, doesnt the 97' hav the stupid security feature? if it does that might be acting up.

I'm sure you are not the only one whos had troubles with the stereo/wiring. Wiring troubles suck , esspecially if your not an electrical person.

Good Luck dtl379, let us know whats up if you find out the prob.

my advice would be go and check fuses one more time.if everything is fine than go to your power wires for your radio and go the down the lines and look for a fuse if no fuse is found keep checking to were power wire goes into and that will probaly be what you burned out. if not you going have to get a power meter to check were your not getting power from. once you locate it just have it replace. next time you install a radio disconnet the negative cable on the battery. you might want to go ask a radio installer for help he would a good idea what you burn out and be able to check it out for you. good luck

Found part of the issue, my battery was at 6 volts, and my ground for the starter came off. Strange.

I still have to find the dash backlighting issue and am getting the schematics today.

The gray wire is the dimmer wire for the factory radio (it signals the display to dim with the instrument lights). The orange wire is 12v ignition power. When the two touched, the power back fed just before blowing the fuse, and could have burnt out the bulbs that back-light the dash.

I have checked the bulbs, because I wondered about that and none of them are blown. I cannot find out what is wrong. The weird thing is that if I touch the orange and grey (the dimmer line) the dash lights up again, so I know the bulbs work.

I just have a couple of questions:

1) do I have to hook up the brown wire that sits between the grey and black on the harness connection? (I have the stereo hooked up now, but the only thing lighting up is the clock-but before I had the brown wire hooked up)

2) Where can I get the wire schematics, because I have a haynes manual and they have what the autozone website has. There have to be relays or circiut breakers I am missing. I will go to the library (I used the L word this time- its contagious), but what manual do I look in?

3) This is a curiosity thing, but I have a junction type thing under the hood, on the driver's side, back near the winsheild next to the clutch fluid check. There are many brightly colored wires going in and out of it, and it twists apart. The inside has little plug ends like you would see on the end of an appliance plug. What is it?