Take your tester and check for voltage at the "BAT" terminal on your fuse box. I'm betting you won't find voltage there and your problem is in the firewall connector that attaches to the back of the fuse box.

 

 

You mean run to? You also mean the smaller wire on the large starter lug......you should have one from the battery (large) and another smaller wire that pretty much powers the rest of the car. This wire goes to the fuse box breakout connector at the firewall as another poster stated. There should be a fusable link in that wire to prevent meltdown in the event of a short or other issue. Check the wire for power along its WHOLE length. I once had a 32' Highboy coupe with a BBC that would run intermittently and quit. It had a bad connection AT the ring terminal on the starter lug. Would make some contact some of the time.

Jebby

 

post a pic of how your starter is wired. You should have 1 additional red wire connected to the batt conection and one purple wire to the solenoid connection, the yellow wire goes to the coil to give it power during startup.

Your starter acts as a buss bar as well. All your power comes into the battery connection, the 10 ga wire that leaves powers the rest of the car, the purple wire comes from your key to engage your starter relay which also gives power to the yellow coil wire, your coil wire may be a different color

red on the main

purple on the s

coil wire on R ( Never connect the Coil wire to the battery connection [You'll burn up your points or fry the coil] or the S connection, [when you go to the run position it will engage your starter])

 

when you jump power what position is the key in and where are you jumping the power from and to, I'm curious if your solenoid is bad, your wired wrong or the fusible linnk is burned .. More pics of this too.

 

 

Brandon Smith - folks are trying to help you but you do not answer queries. Please answer Rescue Rogers' questions above and we can start narrowing this down. Do you have a multimeter?

 

 

Which wire are you jumping to and from where? straight from the battery?

The first pic is the wiring for your wipers and teh yellow should have power all teh time. It looks like it might be hooked to a black wire which could be ground. I would disconnect that and deal with that seperate. It sould have fried some fuses or who knows what. If you look at the coil you can see the whete cloth colored wire that is on the R connector of the starter solenoid

the frayed white wire is for you coil. You should clean that up and put a ring connector on it and reattach it to the R terminal. The 10 gauge red wire should be connected to the same terminal as the 4 gauge wire coming from the battery to the starter. Before you connect it can you please take a pic from further away so we can see what it looks like a foot up the line. Is it connected to anything? That should be the wire going to your horn relay giving you power but I dont see why you are getting a horn unless its hooked to the wrong terminal and the key is on.

That red wire could be coming from the key switch but it should be purple

 

I agree with Roger. These wires have to be fixed. I also agree with carriljc that we are doing as shotgun approach to resolving your problem. My head is spinning trying to figure out where you are and how thoroughly you tested the system.

I propose the following:
If you are willing to start over I will walk you through a series of checks that should identify your problem. Problem is I am working long hours and it will take me a few days to get back to you with the next step. The way I will take you through the system is from beginning to end, not the more conventional way of starting at the most likely problem.

I hope that Roger and others will comment especially if I am suggesting something that is not right.

TEST 1
Test to verify the battery, battery cable continuity, and engine ground.
1. Put car in park/neutral
2. Apply handbrake ( ya, I know)
3. Block wheels
4. Pull ignition coil wire
5. Make sure key is in the off position
6. Go to the picture above and jumper between the “Main Large Battery Cable” and the “S” “Start wire”
7. Hold jumper in position for at least 5 seconds.
The engine should turn over like it is trying to start. Did this occur? Was the engine spinning over briskly?

If it spins over you did the ultimate battery load test and you know you have a good positive battery cable and a good ground at least to the engine.
NOTE: It looks to me that the engine ignition can be back fed through the yellow wire which means the engine can start and stay running as long as the starter is engaged. BE CAREFUL when jumping the starter.
What each wire does:
• Battery cable -obvious
• Red wire with big eye. Connects to the same “Main Large Battery cable” lug and provides power to the entire car
• Purple wire (in your case orange) tells the starter to activate. (why this is orange is a topic for another time)
• Yellow- back-feeds the ignition coil with full battery voltage to provide a hotter spark during start-up

Just let me know if I am wasting my time doing this for you.

 

sounds good to me.

 

 

I understand. I am working 6 days a week 12 hours/day for the next 3 weeks, so I will take several days between posts.

Break the black and the yellow wire apart. To Roger's very valid point you have a yellow wire connected to a black. Black is generally ground on these cars so you may have a dead short. I can't tell for sure where that black wire goes to, but it appears a previous owner may have jury-rigged the wipers. We won't address that in this post at this time

The second frayed wire at the starter only aids in starting the car and will have nothing to do with the problem we are addressing. You can fix that at your convenience.

If you were able to engage the starter for 5 seconds or longer you have as good battery and good battery cables. You also have a good ground to the engine. Did that occur?

Two more questions:
Does your fan blower work?

Is your car air conditioned?

If you don't have a wiring diagram ask for it on this forum:
This thread is located at:
https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...oto=newpostfor

I will post a Help "Help Please" post and ask for a picture of the horn relay/terminal
Alan posted the pictures already. Here is the link
https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...post1597008117

You will have to find and expose this relay. You may want to disconnect the negative cable on the battery when you work on this and only reconnect it for the tests.

When you answer the questions and find the relay we can move on to the next step

 

 

You never answered definitively whether the engine spun for 5 seconds or longer. Did it?

Did you order the wiring diagram?

When was the last time the car ran?

Did you ever drive it?

Based on a review of the wiring diagram, I can tell you with about 99% certainty where your problem is likely to be. Do you want me to tell you or do you want to find it yourself through testing? I'll tell you where I think it is or I'll walk you through the next few tests if you would like.

PS I wasn't jerking you around, I had to mentally walk through the tests I was proposing and figure out the likely outcomes of each. I did in my mind what i am asking you to do on your car.

 

 

going back to those pictures of the starter solenoid. Your have a wire missing the end connector resulting in couple of strands of wire touching the solenoid post and others not doing anything. How do you expect the starter to engage with the wire in that condition???

 

Take several pictures of the engine compartment and post them. Folks on the forum will be able to tell if there is compressor for A/C.

Now then--I'm not one to discourage learning, and I support that it's good to try and fix stuff on your own, but we need some basic understanding of systems prior to engaging in repairs and maintenance. I mention this because it should(statement is meaningless I know) relatively obvious if your vehicle has air conditioning... and if you cannot ascertain this, then you may want to step back and perhaps get some assistance on electrical troubleshooting --- wouldn't want to cause more harm than good.

 

Brandon, like many others, I have a concern that you will burn up your car or get hurt. The most likely cause is the fusible link. If it is the fusible link, make sure you put some device in the line to protect your car.
If it is the fusible link, you have to find out what caused it to fail. Sometimes it is just old age. Other times it is a short circuit. A short circuit can ruin your wiring harness and possibly burn up your car. I personally would go to the local auto parts store and buy an in-line fuse and put it in-line temporarily until I was sure that I did not have other issues. Then I would perform the permanent fix. I also would disconnect the battery cable every time I wasn’t with the car until I was sure it was fixed.


With that said, the failure is in the wire from the horn relay into the cab. There are three possible causes. The most likely being the fusible link. The second most likely is the bulkhead connector. Third and least likely is the wire itself.
The answer was in the first post to your question and reiterated a few posts later. It is likely the fusible link. A fusible link is there to protect the wiring harness and the car. It is a smaller diameter wire (in this case a 16 gage black wire) connected to a larger gage wire (12 gage red wire). In theory, if you get a short circuit, the 16 gage wire will melt open before any damage can occur.
Look at Alan’s close-up picture. The silver bar is the bus bar. There is a black wire coming out of the left terminal (screw). The picture does not show far enough down the wire, but that black wire should turn into a red wire. There should be a larger black cylinder (1/2” dia 3/4” long) at the junction between the black and red wire. That black wire is the fusible link.
Measure the voltage on the bus bar. It should be 12 volts. Take a stick pin and push it into the red wire at the connection to the black wire (right behind the cylinder). Measure voltage from the pin to ground (bare spot on the engine) and if it measures no voltage you found your problem.