Engine/Transmission (1994 - 1998) yet another fuel solenoid question.....

[WDimig]

well i goofed yesterday, while i was finishing up my retorque on my new fire ringged head, i started the truck up, and was checking everything under the hood, and noticed that i forgot to hook up the grid heater wires... ooopppsss, soo i grabbed the wires, and i accidetnally touched one of the wires on the 1st. injector line, truck immediately died, double ooppsss. soo im looking around, checking all fuses, all engine/ fuel system fuses seem to be ok, i go back and try to start the truck, it just cranks over, does not fire. i get my brother to help me, i hold the fuel solenoid arm up, truck fore up, i let go of the arm, it falls, truck dies, ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... . soooo the million dollar question is did i fry my solenoid?? im not sure if my truck has the fusible link on it, i switched relays, that did not help. just looking for some help before i go buy another solenoid. thanks all





wes

 

[Howard Durand]

I doubt if you damaged the solenoid, you are just not getting any voltage to it. Did you check the fuses in both the power distribution center and the fuse panel inside the the cab?

On my 94 truck, fuse #9 in the fuse panel inside the cab feeds just about everything in the engine compartment. It is a 10 amp fuse. Check it or whichever one is labeled as the "engine" fuse for your truck.

 

[K5IP]

I don't have my manual with me, but if you got a big spark when you did this I suspect you blew a fusable link somewhere. The grids run very high current, to high to be protected by a simple fuse.

The fusable link protecting the grid heater circuit is probably also supplying power to the circuit that powers the solonoid.

Rog

 

[Joe G.]

Don't throw parts at it. You can always test the fuel solenoid with jumper wires. Disconnect it. The black wire is ground. The white wire is pull up and the other color is hold. Your '97 may have different colors than my '95, but this is the way to test it. Ground the black wire. Touch 12 volts to the white wire. It should pull up. This is a high current connection so use large wires or only touch it a short time. Connect the other color to 12 volts. It should hold when pulled up. If it passes these tests then you have damaged something else. Hopefully, it's a fuse or fuseable link. If you have a blue wire on the positive post on your battery check it.

 

[Howard Durand]

Not knowing how the 97 is wired, it is hard to guess your problem. The grid heaters for the 94 are each fed with fusible links directly from the battery and they have nothing else connected to them. In light of what took place, yours are probably fed by a fuse or link in the power distribution center. My limited experience with the fusible links is that they act more like a time delay fuse than an instantaneous fuse.

Since your truck died immediately, a blown fuse would be the obvious thing to look for.

 

[Howard Durand]

We may be looking at the wrong end of this situation. If you can't find any blown fuses or fusible links, and since you shorted the heater cable to the fuel line, you might want to check for any burned ground wires.

Since the starter works OK, the engine to battery ground is good but there may be a problem elsewhere.

There is a group of ground wires that connect to the block on the driver's side of #1 cylinder. That would be a good place to start.

 

[Joe G.]

Howard, you may be right about that. That much current sure could have smoked the engine ground strap.

 

[WDimig]

well everyone it was the fuel shut off relay that got toasted. we jumped the relay quickly and the solenoid pulled right up. soo im going to be getting a new relay today, and hopefully that will be the last of my problems



wes

 

[Joe G.]

Well done. That's the way to do it. Find the problem, then fix it instead of just replacing parts in hopes that the problem will go away.

 

[RobertP]

thats the way to do it wes so its all gonna be ready by friday right?

 

[Howard Durand]

When you jumped the shutdown relay with ingnition switch on, did the solenoid stay picked up when you removed the jumper? If so, you got it.