Partial power failure

[dreager]

'92 PAU 300km/180miles

It was kinda cold this morning with slight frost.(first real cold one)Heater fan works, car started ok. Went to adjust mirror....wouldn't budge, same with seats. Stopped at store tried to open door and I'm locked in, used manual unlock. So I reset ECM by disking wire attached near battery, all worked fine then. Later in the day,(4 hours into a long trip)outside temp now 21/C, ABS light comes on 3 seconds after car starts and I am in drive moving.Tried restarting numerous times to see if it will reset, same result, so I disk ECM again, no change ABS still on.

Only things I did recently was ,Change oil/filter (4 days ago), Shoot some Seafoam carbon cleaner thro' the brake booster vacuum line,in the gas tank and in crankcase as per recommended,(1 week ago) oh and sprayed tire cleaner on tires. (Did that early morning, shortly after my first partial power failure) Would tire cleaner overspray have hit the wheel sensor damaging it?

Did I get out of wrong side of bed?

[rksk]

I am not that familiar with the 92 PA, but I bet your initial partial power failure was caused by the opening of one of the 30 amp circuit breakers. The rear window defroster draws a lot of current and probably caused the circuit breaker to open, or you may have a short. I believe that the circuit breaker for the defroster circuit also powers the seat, mirrors, and door lock circuits. When the circuit breaker opens you will loose power to all of those circuits. The circuit breaker will reset itself after it cools down, but will open again if the excessive current load or short still exists. I am not sure where the circuit breakers are on the 92 PA, but I suspect they are at the primary fuse panel. The breaker will get very warm/hot whenever the current draw is high and circuits are heavily loaded. Opening of the circuit breaker may indicate a bad breaker, or a short, or it may be considered normal operation because of the heavy electrical load caused by the defroster circuit. As long as you don't use the defroster, I bet you won't experience the partial power failure again!

Someone else will needs to address the ABS issue, because I don't have a clue.

Regards,
rksk

[dreager]

[quote=rksk]I am not that familiar with the 92 PA, but I bet your initial partial power failure was caused by the opening of one of the 30 amp circuit breakers. The rear window defroster draws a lot of current and probably caused the circuit breaker to open, or you may have a short. I believe that the circuit breaker for the defroster circuit also powers the seat, mirrors, and door lock circuits. When the circuit breaker opens you will loose power to all of those circuits. The circuit breaker will reset itself after it cools down, but will open again if the excessive current load or short still exists. I am not sure where the circuit breakers are on the 92 PA, but I suspect they are at the primary fuse panel. The breaker will get very warm/hot whenever the current draw is high and circuits are heavily loaded. Opening of the circuit breaker may indicate a bad breaker, or a short, or it may be considered normal operation because of the heavy electrical load caused by the defroster circuit. As long as you don't use the defroster, I bet you won't experience the partial power failure again!


Never even dawned on me . Very good observation. Now I know roughly whats on the circuit, and yes I did turn on the rear defroster prior to all this.I noticed the R/Def. wasn't doing its job anyway. I will check the location of the breaker in the service manual as I live in snowy Canada.

Thanks