well my dad drove my beater ek hatch. automatic.
he was driving at night and not 10 mins after he had started the car,
smoke came out from around the gauge cluster and steering column.
i cant check the car out coz he left it at my brothers house and i dont want to drive it home for fear that it might catch on fire.

what are the possible causes/repairs for this kind of electrical damage?


thanks in advance honda-tech

 

get a new interior harness but you won't know till you trouble shoot it sounds like a short

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by blkegcoupe &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">get a new interior harness but you won't know till you trouble shoot it sounds like a short </TD></TR></TABLE>
u know what? i've been wanting to do this before coz i think my underdash harness was messed up by the previous owner. when i turn my a/c on, the vents are operated in the reverse manner (my auto ek is a 96 btw). i think they switched some wires from under there coz when i press on the defroster buttons the front vents are the ones blasting the cold ac

 

Dang YO CAH IS HAWT! sorry no help

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by battle951sedan &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
u know what? i've been wanting to do this before coz i think my underdash harness was messed up by the previous owner. when i turn my a/c on, the vents are operated in the reverse manner (my auto ek is a 96 btw). i think they switched some wires from under there coz when i press on the defroster buttons the front vents are the ones blasting the cold ac </TD></TR></TABLE> they probely cut the harness and just didn't do a very good job at putting it back to oem wiring specs but i wouldn't drive it till you find whats smoking and i doubt it i'll catch on fire maybe the motor but i don't think the interior someone correct me if im wrong

 

Go to your nearest junkyard, find a '96 - '98 hatch automatic, get the wiring harness out of it. If you take it out yourself it should be quite cheap, if you pay them to take it out its gonna be a fair bit more as it takes a long time to get the harness out unless the interior is already stripped out.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by 94EG8 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Go to your nearest junkyard, find a '96 - '98 hatch automatic, get the wiring harness out of it. If you take it out yourself it should be quite cheap, if you pay them to take it out its gonna be a fair bit more as it takes a long time to get the harness out unless the interior is already stripped out.</TD></TR></TABLE>

thanks. so the underdash harness is a given have-to-get item. what about the column (headlight)switches?
i guess i'll have to get in touch with my regular junkyard

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by battle951sedan &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">thanks. so the underdash harness is a given have-to-get item. what about the column (headlight)switches?
i guess i'll have to get in touch with my regular junkyard </TD></TR></TABLE>

The combination switches (headlight and wiper) get there wiring from the interior harness, it goes back almost to the back of the car and goes out through the firewall in the front right up to the core support. If its been hacked up you might as well replace it too, its very time consuming, but i wouldn't exactly call it hard. the dash harness isn't bad at all, you just have to pull out the cluster, climate control and remove the cover under the steering column.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by 94EG8 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

The combination switches (headlight and wiper) get there wiring from the interior harness, it goes back almost to the back of the car and goes out through the firewall in the front right up to the core support. If its been hacked up you might as well replace it too, its very time consuming, but i wouldn't exactly call it hard. the dash harness isn't bad at all, you just have to pull out the cluster, climate control and remove the cover under the steering column.</TD></TR></TABLE>
got it. i havent tackled any interior wiring job yet so this seems quite intimidating. but im pretty sure i can get to it.
so i dont have to pull the dash at all to get to the subharness? just the stuff thats attached to it right?

 

if your just replacing the dash harness than no you wont have to pull the dash, if you do the vehicle harness you pretty much have to strip the entire interior out of the vehicle, its really not as bad as it sounds. one tip i will give you is if removing the dash take the steering column out, theres only 5 bolts holding it in.

 

hey I have a 00 si dash harness for 75 bux. hit me up

 

Si harness wont work as its out of a 5 speed, theres quite a bit more wiring in the automatic dash harness, mostly for the shift indicator in the cluster. The other thing is a lot of plugs changed from '96 - '98 and '99 - '00 climate control is completely different on top of that as well.

 

letting the smoke out!! its going to take some trouble shooting and investigating to find out what kinda hacking the previous owner did. good luck