I got our 1974 Thing out for the 1st time this year last week, and after a short drive we had a small fire in the engine compartment, back between the rear shroud and the firewall; which is odd since there's nothing back there to burn. It was a very small fire, so I was able to put the fire out with a a small bottle of water I had (our fire extinguisher had gone missing!). I trailered it home, and thinking a rodent of some sort may have built a nest back there, I dropped the engine to have a look.
Long story short, I found no signs of a rodent nest (or any other kind of nest) but the fire appeared to be just under or very near to the regulator; the plastic seal around the #3 plug wire was burned, as was the wiring coming to the regulator from the wiring harness, and to a lesser extent the wiring going from the regulator to the Gen, mostly right at the regulator. Perhaps the wiring started it?
So I set about replacing the burned wires. I replaced one wire at a time to avoid confusion, but there was one spot in the wiring harness coming to the regulator where everything was melted together (along with the plastic tubing surrounding the wires). There I had to tease the wires apart one wire at a time. I cut each wire a few inches back from the burned spot, then spliced in a new wire with crimp connectors, and replaced the connector to the regulator as well. For the wires coming from the regulator to the generator, I replaced the entire wire rather than splice. I put in a new regulator as well. FWIW there were two small wires that I couldn't find where they went. One was greyish (which I'm reasonably sure wasn't hooked up to anything - at least we've always had a small grey wire in the engine compartment that wasn't connected to anything), and the other was black. Very small wires (16 gauge?), so they couldn't carry a lot of current.
Once everything was hooked back up, I tried to start her, but nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Not only no start, but no Gen or Oil lights or any other indication that there was juice to the system. The battery is charged, and I had power at the regulator (the big red wire at the top left of the reg that come from the Battery via the starter), but no response. Yes, I checked the fuses.
This isn't my first time to drop a VW engine, so each wire was carefully labeled, and once replaced it looks to match the wiring diagram. (http://www.vintagebus.com/wiring/thing.gif). I'm guessing that there's a ground wire that goes back to the ignition switch that I've overlooked, but for the life of me I can't find it.
Any suggestions?
--
Robin
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Robin Newberry
Clemson, South Carolina
[email protected]
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