Electrical Problem?
Thread Starter
Staging Lane
Joined: Oct 2004
Posts: 54
Likes: 0
From: Culpeper, Va
Electrical Problem? 98 Z28 with 85,000 miles.
Anyway, I've been having problems with what I assume is an electrical problem. All the lights will pulse at times with the rpm's, and I'll get a check gauges light for a split second when I step on the brake pedal. The voltage gauge will jiggle slightly, but drop down quite a bit during "surges" from depressing the brake pedal. All of this only happened a couple of times all of last year, but over the past few days seems to happen almost daily and now the check guages light will come on with normal driving and not using the brakes. Again, only for a split second, but it's becoming pretty frequent. It is also randomly resetting my trip odometer when I turn the car off. Occasionaly when it's doing all of those problems you can also hear something under the hood that sounds like it is powering up for a second then it'll stop, only to go through this cycle a few times then stop.
I had the same problem with this the other night and when I went to stop at a stop light and all of the warning lights came on and the dash lights went dim like the car was about to shut off. I got back on the gas and everything went back to normal.
I can also hear some interference through the speakers when I have the radio turned on (with the volume all the way down) that rises and falls with the engine rpm. I don't know if that's associated with the above problem but I'm adding it just incase it is.
I'm thinking alternator, but I want to have a better idea before I go replacing parts that don't fix the problem. The battery is a year and a half old and the alternator is the orginal.
Thanks.
Anyway, I've been having problems with what I assume is an electrical problem. All the lights will pulse at times with the rpm's, and I'll get a check gauges light for a split second when I step on the brake pedal. The voltage gauge will jiggle slightly, but drop down quite a bit during "surges" from depressing the brake pedal. All of this only happened a couple of times all of last year, but over the past few days seems to happen almost daily and now the check guages light will come on with normal driving and not using the brakes. Again, only for a split second, but it's becoming pretty frequent. It is also randomly resetting my trip odometer when I turn the car off. Occasionaly when it's doing all of those problems you can also hear something under the hood that sounds like it is powering up for a second then it'll stop, only to go through this cycle a few times then stop.
I had the same problem with this the other night and when I went to stop at a stop light and all of the warning lights came on and the dash lights went dim like the car was about to shut off. I got back on the gas and everything went back to normal.
I can also hear some interference through the speakers when I have the radio turned on (with the volume all the way down) that rises and falls with the engine rpm. I don't know if that's associated with the above problem but I'm adding it just incase it is.
I'm thinking alternator, but I want to have a better idea before I go replacing parts that don't fix the problem. The battery is a year and a half old and the alternator is the orginal.
Thanks.
I had a problem like that when I bought my TA. I would hit the breaks and the lights would get dim. I got it home and it wouldnt start. Turned out that there was a bad cell in the battery. May want to try that before an alternator.
On The Tree
Joined: Aug 2005
Posts: 122
Likes: 0
alright i have the same problem when i push the brakes the lights dim or say push both the power windows up when they are already up the lights will dim or in any case u put lots of load of power i guess. But the battery is fairly new and the alt is new. The stereo though doesnt dim anything. So maybe I need to upgrade the wires to the big 3 ?
Well, before I replaced my alternator my car would randomly reset the trip odometer in between starts and I'd be like "wtf?"
So, it definitely could be your alternator, have you had it checked? Most auto parts shops will do a charging system test for free or a small fee.
The very day it went out I was driving and the dash lights came on one by one while the headlights shut themselves down and the ASR turned itself off.
So, it definitely could be your alternator, have you had it checked? Most auto parts shops will do a charging system test for free or a small fee.
The very day it went out I was driving and the dash lights came on one by one while the headlights shut themselves down and the ASR turned itself off.
