Ground/Short Problem?

[Kevin R.]

This is the strangest problem I have ever had, and I don't even know where to start.

Here is the story:

I left my campus today go get some food. About 10 minutes down the road I jumped on the highway and a minute later my temp and oil pressure shot through the roof. I think the temp gauge hit 245 and the oil pressure was over the H.

I thought my car was blowing up or something. So I swung it over to the shoulder and shut it down. I checked everything out visually and everything seemed fine. Coolant...oil....no leaks...all accounted for.

Then, some guy in a pick-up stops. He is pretty smart and says it may be a headgasket, because the coolant going into the oil would raise the pressure. I thought "Oh great...more problems."

Then, he says it may be a ground. He grabs some cables and grounds the car to the battery. From ground to ground..it sparks. Also, when he puts it on the gauges and everything returned to where they should be during normal running...until you broke the ground he had made.

Now, last week I had Ford put in a starter after we bought a brand new starter and put it in after I got stranded at a gas station. With the new starter we put in...it still wouldnt start. So, I had it towed to Ford. They said that our brand new starter was shorted and broken so we just had them throw one it..and it worked. We then took that starter back to Autozone and they tested it before we could return it. The starter that Ford said was bad...worked fine.

So, basically, now I have this ground or shorting problem.

Where can I check first...I dont even know where to begin.

Thanks,
Kevin

 

[Kevin R.]

I forgot to mention that after I realized my car wasn't overheating/blowing up I drove it back and the gauges kind of returned to normal.

I dont want to never be able to tell if my car is overheating.

BTW..this is both my Autometer temp and car temp, as well as the stock oil pressure. Autometer gauge is electrical..

 

[Car Nut]

I had ground issues that caused all kinds of problems. Turned out I just needed to clean the ground connection at the engine block. There's a nut that holds the ground cable to the block and I wiped the cable end and nut real good with sandpaper. I also wiped the screw with sandpaper a little bit to to shine it up slightly. BINGO! All problems went away.

A few months later, this problem appeared again and then later again. Turns out every time I would wash the engine bay area, the ground would need cleaning a bit later.

To solve all this (without replacing the main ground cable), I bought a ground cable the same size as the stocker from Autozone. The cable was pretty short. I connected it to the ground connection at the battery (just joined it with the main ground battery connection) and then ran the other end to the front of the car. There was a small ground wire connected within a foot of the battery, so I combined the connections.

No problems since and it's been at least 3 years.

Never had guage issues...........the car just wouldn't start sometimes or it would act like there were major electrical issues (almost like a bad alternator).

 

[blksn955.o]

I had the exact same issue, with the guages, no start, it even started causing the fans to not turn on.

When it was in the "not starting mode" I ran a jumper wire (like 6 or 8ga) from the batt. to chassis, with no dice. Then from the batt. to block....again no dice. Finaly I went from the block to chassis and it fired right up and the guage issue went away. I made a new block to chassis ground wire and no more issues.

 

[gcomfx.com]

I had the exact same issue, with the guages, no start, it even started causing the fans to not turn on.

Hey that might be my problem right there.... the car runs hot until I switch on my manual high speed fan switch I added, which is just a new ground. Interesting.

Oh, and my guages also freak every so often... I clean my batter cables and it helps. Engine is coming out soon.... all new grounds are in the plans when I relocate the battery.

 

[Kevin R.]

Hmm. Ya I might just end up running a new ground.

I'll check it out today.

Thanks.

 

[HISSIN50]

If the tow truck adding a ground cable fixed the issue, then you know what you need to do.

There's a weak block to chassis ground from the driver's side engine mount to the frame. You can clean that one or add another. I mirrored that OEM ground on the passenger side. The addition of the 4 AWG cable (from the parts store - generic starter cable = 4 bucks) helps with dirty grounds or if the stock braided one disintegrates.

Beefing up the battery ground (terminal to chassis) is a good idea. Remember, the flow of electrons is negative to positive as I recall.

Good luck.

 

[Kevin R.]

Isn't it weird though that when he connect ground to ground it sparked?

What could cause that?

 

[Blackened302]

may also want to replace your battery terminals as it's cheap/easy. i had electrical issues last week and all's well now that i put new terminals on and cleaned up some of the major connections.

 

[mo_dingo]

Isn't it weird though that when he connect ground to ground it sparked?

What could cause that?

Current flows from negative to positive; When you connected the ground wire, you allowed current to flow through that wire, and the current jumped the gap before it was connected securely.
Scott