Lights & Horn Out. . .AGAIN!

[grsthegreat]

it all depends on the wire size...not the load on the circuit.

not so much in tractors, but i see the results of people overpowering wires all the time. Heck, just today i went and looked at an electric house heater that caught fire. Apparently it kept tripping the breaker, so they simply installed a larger breaker. The furnace caught on fire. Luckily they were able to put out the fire without the house burning down.

They called me to see if i could rewire the old heater...like id touch that with a 20 foot pole.

 

[GManBart]

it all depends on the wire size...not the load on the circuit.

not so much in tractors, but i see the results of people overpowering wires all the time. Heck, just today i went and looked at an electric house heater that caught fire. Apparently it kept tripping the breaker, so they simply installed a larger breaker. The furnace caught on fire. Luckily they were able to put out the fire without the house burning down.

They called me to see if i could rewire the old heater...like id touch that with a 20 foot pole.

Now that was complete stupidity! I might take a bit of a risk with a tractor headlight fuse, but a house heater....no way.

 

[RAYJAY]

i had it once on my tractor replaced it with a new buse fuse from the auto parts store, could it be just bad fuses .............

 

[BobRip]

Here is an approach I have used successfully. Pull the fuse and connect a 12 volt bulb across the fuse holder. A car headlamp is a good choice. Have someone watch the bulb and go around the tractor and wiggle wires, harnesses and connector. Tap light bulbs, etc. Of course the bulb will flash or flicker or brighten when the short happens. This will help you find an intermittent short. It may help if you pull all of your light bulbs before doing this. I would leave the bulbs in at first.

Given your description of your blown fuse, it sounds like an overload. In this case put a current meter in the line and monitor the current. If it exceeds the fuse rating, or even close the fuse can blow over time. Even overloaded a fuse can last for hours. You may not normally run it long enough to make it blow. The fuse can age quickly if overloaded and just fail from being marginally overloaded for accumulated time. If this is the case it may be the wrong bulb(s) or you may have to run a separate circuit for some of the loads.

Sorry for being so wordy. I hope this helps.

 

[BobRip]

Another possibility is a bad fuse holder. This can make the fuse run hotter and blow easier. Look for signs of melting plastic.

 

[k0ua]

Here is an approach I have used successfully. Pull the fuse and connect a 12 volt bulb across the fuse holder. A car headlamp is a good choice. Have someone watch the bulb and go around the tractor and wiggle wires, harnesses and connector. Tap light bulbs, etc. Of course the bulb will flash or flicker or brighten when the short happens. This will help you find an intermittent short. It may help if you pull all of your light bulbs before doing this. I would leave the bulbs in at first.

Given your description of your blown fuse, it sounds like an overload. In this case put a current meter in the line and monitor the current. If it exceeds the fuse rating, or even close the fuse can blow over time. Even overloaded a fuse can last for hours. You may not normally run it long enough to make it blow. The fuse can age quickly if overloaded and just fail from being marginally overloaded for accumulated time. If this is the case it may be the wrong bulb(s) or you may have to run a separate circuit for some of the loads.

Sorry for being so wordy. I hope this helps.

Another possibility is a bad fuse holder. This can make the fuse run hotter and blow easier. Look for signs of melting plastic.

This is good information, I would measure the total current first and redesign the circuit if needed. I have also seen intermittent shorts in the actual lamps themselves. I had one in a 1974 Thunderbird, that took me a while to find. Turned out to just be a bad taillight bulb. These are the type of problems mechanics cannot find. You must resolve them yourselves. A mechanic does not have the time for intermittent's, he will replace half an automobile first before taking the time to troubleshoot an intermittent. No kick on mechanics, they just don't have a couple of weeks to troubleshoot and try different things to find these "tough dog" problems. You do. Example: we had a television in our shop (back in the day when people repaired television's to the component level). This TV had been looked at by two good tech, for over 2 years, including the shop owner. They gave it to me, the new kid when I hired on. The symptom was a single vertical roll once about every 10 minutes. It only took me about 2 months to find a disc ceramic capacitor that looked like a semiconductor on a curve tracer. I have never seen a capacitor that exhibited characteristics of a diode before or since. Moral of the story, is you as an owner may be the only person that has the time to troubleshoot and find a problem like this.

 

[captaineddie]

UPDATE: My tractor is now at the dealership and they're working on the problem. The fuses are getting hot and blowing at 1500 RPMs. They do not blow at a lower power setting. I'll probably have an update tomorrow or Wednesday. They're determined to find the problem.

 

[Underdog57]

UPDATE: My tractor is now at the dealership and they're working on the problem. The fuses are getting hot and blowing at 1500 RPMs. They do not blow at a lower power setting. I'll probably have an update tomorrow or Wednesday. They're determined to find the problem.

Thank goodness for warranties, kinda nice to let somebody else worry about the problem!

 

[BobRip]

Oh shucks, I wanted to help fix it.

 

[k0ua]

Oh shucks, I wanted to help fix it.

It would be interesting to know what the charging voltage is a various RPM's Wouldn't it?