Smoke from Dash

[LKostyak]

I have an 03 with about 12k miles on it. For the past several months I have smelt something like hot or burning electronics on occasion (probably 2-3 times). Each time I was in traffic and have assumed it was something coming in from outside through the fresh air vent.



When I started my truck this past Friday at work a fairly good amount of smoke came from the dash in the vicinity of the air vent on the right hand side of the radio. I immediately killed the ignition and it stopped. It was enough smoke that I had to open the doors to vent it out. About 3-4 minutes later I restarted the truck and did not experience the problem. I checked all gauges, lights, and made sure everything worked. I could find no problems. I drove to the dealership about an hour away. They tore down the center of the dash and could find nothing. They advised I just keep an eye on it.



Has anyone else experienced smoke from the dash or a strong electronics smell? Something burnt, I just don’t know what. Any ideas?







My apology if this has already been posted. I couldn't find anything except recalls for earlier models for the blower motor wiring.

 

[StephenThomas]

Sounds like a trip to the dealer is in order.

 

[rbattelle]

You've obviously got something shorting out big-time back there. I'm surprised the dealer didn't tell you "it's normal, all the diesels do it". I'd take the dash apart myself and look for a burned connection... the dealer might not have wanted to take the time to search carefully.

 

[Midnight]

Ya, i would take it apart and look aswell. It should be easy enough to find. I'd even take a wiff inside the radio itself. Good luck.

 

[LKostyak]

Good advice. I will plan to tear it down next weekend if I can find the time. I report back what I find, if anything.



Just wanted to be sure it wasn't something that someone had already experienced to save me a bit of time.

 

[fraserrj]

If you have the bose stero that is where the amp is located

 

[Chris N5CWM]

Get a fire extinguisher until this is figured out. If there is enough heat there will be a fire and by the time you see the flames it's too late. Only a fire ext will stop it. By the time the fire dept gets there it'll be trashed.

I'd go with a CO2 or Halon if you can find them, because the dry chemical extinguishers make a HUGE mess and the white powder is very corrosive. It'll stop the fire but there will be an expensive cleanup.



http://www.fire-extinguisher101.com/

 

[Russknh]

Long

I had a friend that years ago used to deliver campers and RV's for Morgan. He had a body builder in Denver build him a flatbed truck that he could put a Lance on and pull a trlr that had two other campers on it. In those days they would plug all the campers in to connectors on the trlr and use the camper lights for the marker and tailights. If you count up all the lights on all campers you can see where this is going. In this time Dodge did not give the body builders the info they needed to wire the custom bodies like they do now so them being average body building idiots just tied into the removed fender harnesses from the stock dually bed. He drove like this for several months smelling burning wires many times and other times nothing, he finally blew a couple of fuses in the San Bernadino area and went to a large dealer in that area who had their top mechanic check it out and he promptly fixed it--with larger fuses of course. Two months later he burned up every harness on the truck, the ones uder the bed, the ones under the hood and the one going down the inside of the steering column from the stoplight load and turnsignals and the main one under the dash. I examined this failure in detail and we sued the dealer in CA, the body builder in Denver and Dodge for not furnishing the proper instructions to body builders--we received a grand total of --0-- after their attorneys blamed each other and had the court so confused--moral of this story CHECK IT OUT YOURSELF!!!

 

[RLighthall]

When I took my '03 in for an instrument cluster reflash per the TSB addressing the hit-n-run check gauges light, the darn thing (instrument cluster) caught fire and had to be replaced. Must have been one heck of an update...