Well, I dont' know about almost, but on my sisters 90 Accord LX, something really weird happened today.

Don't know and actually don't believe it has anything to do with it, but the Alpine CD player in the car stopped powering up like a month ago. I was going to look at it, but she (my sister) is never around. Anyway, today she said it all the sudden worked again. I was thinkin bad ground or something. Well, tonight (she has been driving the car today some)the hood. Electrical smoke! I popped the hood to see the GROUND CABLE COMPLETELY RED LIKE A she went to start it, and tons of smoke came under SNAKE! I disconnected the battery cable immediately. All the insulation around the ground cable was completely toast! Bare wire left!!! My sister said that when she started it, she turned it off, but it kept running?! Once the ground cooled off, the lights also came back on (as i guess electrical system turned off as the ground was super hott!)

Upon further inspection, the ground cable did not seem to be touching any circuits or anything. Just grounded the block, and it was still pretty solid. After things cooled I pushed it into the garage, took off the negative cable, and noticed that the power cable into the starter boots seemed to melt and fray away. I am guessing that either the hottness of the cable steamed up and kinda melted the rubber off, or it had something to do with it.

I took the starter out, and besides the boots being burnt off, the connections seemed not too bad, and nothing abnormal. I mean this cable was a glowing snake, and it burnt a dent into the hood (only under the hood tho). I'm going to take the starter in tommorow to the parts store so they can test it.

Anyone have any ideas what caused this? The positive cable seems totally fine. The negative just seemed to totally burn out! Maybe something wrong with the battery? It was replaced about 2 years ago.

Oh yeah, the positive terminal does have a red boot over it protecting the clamp on the terminal.


Thanks!

 

Something was short circuiting. Electrical current flows to the least resistance, in your case, the ground cable.

 

same thing is kinda happening with mine.. the ground cable will leave the car on for a bit when the key is off.. and it sparks hella and gets really hot.!! umm.. i'm curious to what it could be too...

 

Which ground cable was glowing? The main one from the battery to the block, or the the small one from the valve cover to the radiator bulkhead?

If the main battery ground cable was glowing hot, it's because more current was going through it than it could handle. So why didn't the positive cable heat up, you ask? It's because there is probably corrosion at the clamp end of the ground cable or the wires are frayed away at the block end. This effectively reduces the current carrying capacity. Replace it. The positive cable is in better condition, so it didn't heat up.

Now, you have to determine what drew all that current. I would guess the starter hung up. That's why the car wouldn't turn off. It also would explain the melted boots at the starter.

If the small ground wire at the valve cover was glowing, same as above. The main battery ground cable or connections are no good, forcing the smaller gauge wire to carry more current than it could handle.

 

If the starter boot was melted- this is most likely your problem- your starter could have been internally shorted to ground and since the negative cable from the tranny is thinner than the positive cable to the starter- it melted its insulation. Sounds like it is time for a new starter- the starter cable is the only non-fused power source in your car- (except the battery to fusebox feed). Current was flowing through your engine/trans assembly (evidenced from melting wire and boot) through your starter back through the ground cable to your battery. I would replace any damaged wires and get a new starter (preferably from Honda).

 

Yep, took the starter into Pep Boys for them to test it today, and the guy was like "so what's up with this" I told him, be careful, it burned a two inch wide hole in the hood. He's like whoa.... so he really carefully connects it up to his starter testing machine, it arched like a mother!!! He jumped back and almost **** his pants!!! It was funny. But yeah, the starter was crankin out about 220 amps! So I'll replace the starter and the ground cable and we should be back in business.

Thanks for the responses, somehow my post in the Accord forum got cutted and pasted a bit incorrectly, and my first paragraph had a few words that didn't make sense. Needless to say many people turned *** on a newbie Oh well.

 

b16_ef - not sure what this means:

"...the ground cable will leave the car on for a bit when the key is off..."

but if you see sparks from a ground cable it might be a case of tightening the bolts that attach it to whatever...

t..