electrical problems on my C5, strange!
Thread Starter
Instructor
Joined: Feb 2006
Posts: 220
Likes: 0
From: Jacksonville Florida
electrical problems on my C5, strange!
Either my car hates me or its just a snap of alot of bad luck. My AC went out last week, and that is not good when living in Florida, but this is not why I am posting. What I am wondering about is what happened yesterday. I was driving and out of nowhere the car goes nuts. The info screen displays the following 'reduce engine power' and folling that, the gas gage goes to empty, the radio goes dead, and it says to service active handling and tire pressure gage. The driveability of the car is not hendered, but this is quite annoying. To make things worse, the passenger window is now stuck down. Any ideas??? I guess its time to put her up for a while and only use the d/d. 
Racer
Joined: Jun 2003
Posts: 256
Likes: 0
From: Newport Beach Ca
Any codes -- current or history. Forget all the "U" codes --------
Beyond that -- yes, I have ideas. Start with the simple things. Are your battery terminal connections clean and tight?? How's your battery -- healthy or marginal -- if it's marginal, might want to start with a new battery.
Read the sticky by Bill Curlee -- "Important Electrical Information". Clean and tighten the four grounds on front frame rail.
If none of that helps, try following this link for more possible causes.
http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=1602677
Beyond that -- yes, I have ideas. Start with the simple things. Are your battery terminal connections clean and tight?? How's your battery -- healthy or marginal -- if it's marginal, might want to start with a new battery.
Read the sticky by Bill Curlee -- "Important Electrical Information". Clean and tighten the four grounds on front frame rail.
If none of that helps, try following this link for more possible causes.
http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=1602677
Thread Starter
Instructor
Joined: Feb 2006
Posts: 220
Likes: 0
From: Jacksonville Florida
the battery is 2 months old, so I dont see the problem being that, unless the connections are lose, as you said. I have not checked the codes, but Ill take a look when I get off work and get home. Ill go take a look at Bill's sticky now. Thanks
Tech Contributor
Joined: Dec 1999
Posts: 32,910
Likes: 2,402
From: Anthony TX
CI 6,7,8,9,11 Vet
St. Jude Donor '08
Having bizarre dash symptoms and the added problem of the door not functioning leads me to having you check the rubber accordion tubes between the doors on both doors.
You can grab the tubes and pinch them , feel for the two wiring harnesses inside the rubber tubes. Grab the wires (through the rubber accordion tubes) and shake them. Then see if the doors will work and the weird dash symptoms go away while your shaking or after you shake the harnesses!
I press and hold the up OR down button for the window while shaking the harnesses. Most of the time it will cause the problems to stop happening. If that corrects the issue, I will tell you how to fix it permanently!
If thats not it, See if the BCM in the passengers foot well is wet or damp. With the AC not working, I'm not sure if condensation is going to leak of the air box out unless your HVAC Air Box is full of water and unable to drain. Do you have NORMAL AC Fan operation???
BC
You can grab the tubes and pinch them , feel for the two wiring harnesses inside the rubber tubes. Grab the wires (through the rubber accordion tubes) and shake them. Then see if the doors will work and the weird dash symptoms go away while your shaking or after you shake the harnesses!
I press and hold the up OR down button for the window while shaking the harnesses. Most of the time it will cause the problems to stop happening. If that corrects the issue, I will tell you how to fix it permanently!
If thats not it, See if the BCM in the passengers foot well is wet or damp. With the AC not working, I'm not sure if condensation is going to leak of the air box out unless your HVAC Air Box is full of water and unable to drain. Do you have NORMAL AC Fan operation???
BC
Racer
Joined: Apr 2007
Posts: 330
Likes: 33
From: Milwaukee WI
Check the battery connections first. The fact that it's 2 months old is a tipoff that maybe the terminals weren't greased when it was installed. This happened to my Grand Am. It would not start intermittently, and you could turn the ignition to on and the gages would jump around all nutslike.
Thread Starter
Instructor
Joined: Feb 2006
Posts: 220
Likes: 0
From: Jacksonville Florida
Well, I tried shaking the tubes between the doors and the window went up quickly, so I thank you for that I did not drive the car yesterday, and in the two times that the reduce engine power crap happened was after about 20 minutes of driving, so I cannot report the progress on that yet. It is possible that the floorboard was damp because I had to drive the car in the rain for about an hour on Monday, and with no AC it got very hard to see out of the windows. I do have normal fan operations. Thanks again
I did not drive the car yesterday, and in the two times that the reduce engine power crap happened was after about 20 minutes of driving, so I cannot report the progress on that yet. It is possible that the floorboard was damp because I had to drive the car in the rain for about an hour on Monday, and with no AC it got very hard to see out of the windows. I do have normal fan operations. Thanks again
Tech Contributor
Joined: Dec 1999
Posts: 32,910
Likes: 2,402
From: Anthony TX
CI 6,7,8,9,11 Vet
St. Jude Donor '08
Well, I tried shaking the tubes between the doors and the window went up quickly, so I thank you for that I did not drive the car yesterday, and in the two times that the reduce engine power crap happened was after about 20 minutes of driving, so I cannot report the progress on that yet. It is possible that the floorboard was damp because I had to drive the car in the rain for about an hour on Monday, and with no AC it got very hard to see out of the windows. I do have normal fan operations. Thanks again
I did not drive the car yesterday, and in the two times that the reduce engine power crap happened was after about 20 minutes of driving, so I cannot report the progress on that yet. It is possible that the floorboard was damp because I had to drive the car in the rain for about an hour on Monday, and with no AC it got very hard to see out of the windows. I do have normal fan operations. Thanks again
I had the same thing happen when I was 200 miles away from home on a business trip!
Car would NOT start and the gages were going spastic! I used some electrical tape to insulate the wire and have been trouble free for 2 years! The wire that is exposed is the SERIAL DATA BUSS wire so,, it corrupts the serial data to the other modules.
I figured it out cause I was having intermittant issues with both doors just prior to the car going spastic.
Fix that issue and see how the car runs. bet you will be back on the road!
BC
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Same symptoms, found the bare wire (why in the world GM would have a bare wire I'll never understand), wrapped it up, and no more problems in the past 3 years.
