Fire! Fire!

[Toro67]

Warning: Long rant...

Note to self: "When buying electrical parts from unknown sources, check the wiring BEFORE connecting power to it!"

So I buy a conversion kit to convert my standard sealed beam bulbs to a more modern H4 bulb with brighter lights and more power. The problem is you go from 60W/55W to 100W/80W and your old car's electrical system was not built for that. The solution is to wire up some relays that get a signal from your old light system and provide power to the new lights directly from the battery/charging system. There are two companies (that I have found) that make this is kit: Painless and APC. The Painless kit costs $100 while the one from APC is $35. I choose APC even though I've used Painless wiring kits and I know they are high quality.

The kit from APC was easy to install: Just plug in the two relays, connect two female plugs to your new headlamps, connect the ground wire for the two lamps, connect a male plug to one of the old female lamp plugs (this is to get the high/low beam signal to the realys), then connect the power cable to your battery and fire it up. The low beams worked fine but when I switched to the high beams, there wasn't any light. after a few seconds of scratching my head, I see smoke billowing out from under my hood! I shut everything off and hop out to disconnect the burning wire bundle from my battery. I disconnect the harness from my car and take it inside to figure out what happened, assuming it was something I did.



How the relay is supposed to be wired: On the coil side of the relay you have the high beam signal on one side and ground on the other. On the switch side you have the battery on one side and the high beam lamp (new one) on the other side, such that when you get a signal for high beams, this closes the contacts and provides power directly from the battery to the high beam lamp. The way the relay was wired was, on the coil side you had the high beam signal on one side and the high beam lamp on the other side. On the switch side you had the battery on one side and ground on the other!! This way, when I switched to high beams, this closed the contacts and provided a direct path to ground!!

Next time I'll be sure to trace out the wires and make sure things make sense. :(

This winter I have:
Converted an old powerglide to a 700R4
Converted from column shift to floor shift
Converted 3.08 gears to 3.73 gears
Converted an open rear end to an Eaton Posi
Swapped out the old 327 for a 350
Upgraded to a serpentine belt system with Billet Specialties brackets
Converted from a worn out manual box to a 14:1 PS set up
Installed a Flaming River tilt column
Installed ceramic coated headders
Installed Covan's Dash
Installed new seats
Installed new hood and had it painted (movers damaged my old hood).

There is not one thing on that list that did not have major problems associated with it. I could write a paragraph on each one describing the problems I had. I did not do the transmission and rear-end work, but I know the shop had problems. I did everything else and had major problems. It's like the car has a mind of it own and refuses to change! It gets me down sometimes, but when it is actually running, it is a blast to drive!

...rant over

[6'9"Witha69]

Shoulda called MAD!

And yes, always double check the wiring before reconnecting anything.

[Gordz32]

Dang! you gotta alot done this winter. Sorry to hear bout the little fire

[John McIntire]

Shoulda called MAD!

And yes, always double check the wiring before reconnecting anything.

Yeah, with Marks kit, YOU do the wiring, so you know its done right!

[zbugger]

Yeah, with Marks kit, YOU do the wiring, so you know its done right!

lol... That or you know exactly who to blame for ****ing the entire thing up....

I used what looks like the APC harness on my car. Got it quite a few years ago and didn't have any problems. Then again, I traced the wires and made sure the relays were plugged in correctly and completely. I realized a LONG time ago just how much is really in the little details.

[John S]

Sorry bout your fire but one more thing to remember that would have avoided the fire is to always use a fuse whenever you are feeding power from the battery. In your case the fuse would have blown alerting you to a problem without starting a fire.

[MuscleRodz]

AAW has them as well, a universal kit or one specifically for headlight systems

Mike

[DarkoNova]

Yeah I got that APC harness when I upgraded to H4. I eventually got rid of it because it uses some obscure relays that are impossible to find. I called the company and they said there's only one company in the whole USA that makes/sells them, and they're a good 2000 miles from me.

I got the Painless one and it's infinitely higher quality, and uses nice Bosch relays.

I also got smoking wires, but that was because when I took off the APC harness, I hooked up the original wires. I wanted to see if I really needed a new harness. Turns out, I did, LOL.

Matt