The Canadiana build thread

[bravekozak]

The problem is oxidation of the terminals inside the main fuse housing. The open ends results in loss of conductivity and intermittent problems.

[ryanprins13]

I fixed the problem by taking apart the fuse block and wire wheeling the terminals then replacing them with long leg'd pal fuses pink green pink. Now it's my first mod along with ground clean up.

Did you ever feel the alternater to battery wire after this while your 1500 watt amp had been running for a bit to see if it was hot? I am just wondering if the bad fuseable link connection was the only problem of if the wire from the alt to battery is also a bit undersized. Green fuse is 40amps and alternater puts out 50amps, so it should blow it shouldnt it?

Pal
They can be had at any autoparts store just make sure they have to longer ends on them the short won't reach the spades fully

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Thanks!

Pictures can be found using the search engine.

Yes, i know, i also had pictures saved on my phone but didnt have the name and was in a hurry working on the car and it needed to drive out of the shop that night. I thought i would need to buy at least one right away, but i had my spare fusable links with me.
You and william used 2 pink and 1 green fuse. 30 amp for the pink and 40amp for the main fuse. The guy whos car i took photos of used 2 blues and a green. The blue being 20amp.
Whats correct? I would look up what the fuseable links are rated for but the wires are different colours than the fuseable link box says and my middle one was white and a guy i phoned said his middle one is black...

You're asking about cartridge-type fuses (click) suited for use as fusible links.

Fusible link wiring (click) is also available. There's significant online discussion (last click) regarding the hows and whys that suggest fusible links in place of substitute fuses.

Thanks. From my understanding and experience fuseable links take 5 or so seconds of overcurrent to melt and break, so they can handle sudden momentary overcurrents. Most fuses blow right away. But a half melted fuseable link isnt that great either.


Looks like my resonater reduced my ground clearance to about 6 inches



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[william]

Yeah every thing was cool , that was my first worry that stuff was overheating.
I kept blowing mine until I cleaned up the connection.
The corrosion creates resistance and heats things up.
Releasing the pins from the block can be a pain but it's worth it.

[FestYboy]

Just because an alternator CAN put out 50A, doesn't mean that it always does. An alternator is a regulated power source that only puts out what is needed. Also, even if the alt was maxed out, not all 50A would be going through that one 40A fuse, it would be split between all the current draws in the car.

[bravekozak]

According to the EVTM, Main is 25A, Head is 15A and PTC (EGI) is 15A.

ryan, there is no snow in Toronto.

[ryanprins13]

Yeah every thing was cool , that was my first worry that stuff was overheating.
I kept blowing mine until I cleaned up the connection.
The corrosion creates resistance and heats things up.
Releasing the pins from the block can be a pain but it's worth it.

Good, thank you.

Just because an alternator CAN put out 50A, doesn't mean that it always does. An alternator is a regulated power source that only puts out what is needed. Also, even if the alt was maxed out, not all 50A would be going through that one 40A fuse, it would be split between all the current draws in the car.

I know, the biggest load i plan to put on it is to run a 750 watt toaster off the inverter. That takes more than 50amps and the toaster runs for a bit so i want to be safe.
Ok, i thought the wire must run from the alternater, through that fuseable link, then to the battery. I didnt realize it was split up, which doesnt make sense, but i believe it was you that sent me the wiring diagram for this car. I printed it off at the time and i will look at it.
There was no current draw through the car wiring except from the alt to the battery because the inverter was hooked directly to the battery.

According to the EVTM, Main is 25A, Head is 15A and PTC (EGI) is 15A.

ryan, there is no snow in Toronto.

Oh, alright. Thank you very much. Can i ask why people go with significantly higher rated PAL fuses?

Lol, im ok with snow, not ok with Wynn. Although that probably isnt much worse than what we have.



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[Shin Hayata]

According to the EVTM, [the fusible links are as follows:] Main is 25A, Head is 15A and PTC (EGI) is 15A.

The related cartridge fuses are available in 20, 30, 40, 50 and 60 amps only. I carry a 20 amp cartridge fuse as an emergency spare, but I'll replace any spent fusible link with new link wiring (after first diagnosing and repairing the source of the over-voltage.)

[FestYboy]

I know, the biggest load i plan to put on it is to run a 750 watt toaster off the inverter. That takes more than 50amps and the toaster runs for a bit so i want to be safe.
Ok, i thought the wire must run from the alternater, through that fuseable link, then to the battery. I didnt realize it was split up, which doesnt make sense, but i believe it was you that sent me the wiring diagram for this car. I printed it off at the time and i will look at it.
There was no current draw through the car wiring except from the alt to the battery because the inverter was hooked directly to the battery.
.

If the inverter is wired directly to the battery, the rest of the system will never see the load from the toaster, so you're good there. The alt will only put out the 50A it's rated for and the rest will come from the battery. So there's no need to replace any of the car fuses with anything more than what was suggested for the PAL fuse replacements.

[ryanprins13]

If the inverter is wired directly to the battery, the rest of the system will never see the load from the toaster, so you're good there. The alt will only put out the 50A it's rated for and the rest will come from the battery. So there's no need to replace any of the car fuses with anything more than what was suggested for the PAL fuse replacements.

Thats why i am confused about why the fuseable link burnt up when i used the inverter. But i will check that diagram tonight to see what runs through there, thanks.



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[ryanprins13]

If the inverter is wired directly to the battery, the rest of the system will never see the load from the toaster, so you're good there. The alt will only put out the 50A it's rated for and the rest will come from the battery. So there's no need to replace any of the car fuses with anything more than what was suggested for the PAL fuse replacements.

Please tell me if i am understanding this correctly:

Im not the best at understanding these diagrams.
It looks to me like the battery feeds all 3 links on the strut side of the fuseable link panel. The alternator wire comes into the rad support side of the 'main' fuseable link.
So if i draw over 50 amps from the battery, the alternator will try to put out 50 amps and all of it will go through that one 'main' fuseable link to get from the alt to the battery.
It is fused for 25 amps even though the alt puts out 50 because there is nothing stock on the festiva that could draw over 25 amps.
Is that correct?
If so i think i should get a 50amp fuse and check the size of alt-to-fuse link panel wire to see if its large enough for 50amps.
(The toaster i want to use camping will draw 65 amps but it never was an issue on my other festiva for the fuseable link. Never felt the alternater wire though.)
Thanks

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[ryanprins13]

So anyway, I have decided that since the wire is sized big enough for up to 60 amps, the alternator will put out 50 and I will draw more than 50 amps that i should get a 50 amp fuse for the main and a 60 as backup in case the alternator puts out 55 amps or something.

Releasing the pins from the block can be a pain but it's worth it.

what do you use to release the pins?


So since my last update I did a lot of re-planning, bought a fair bit of stuff on rockauto and locally, ordered my tires!!! , figured out what I was missing on the a/c setup i had and got the missing parts shipped.

Last Saturday the 14th i robbed some more parts off my red festiva then went to buy a battery. I still wasn't quite sure yet what I needed and the battery store only had 1 employee and the place was packed. It took me 1.5hrs to get that battery, but i learned a bit more about batteries and got some ideas on chargers and the trailer battery. battery is a group 24 dual purpose (kinda deep cycle and kinda starting) magnacharge dc-140; 140min reserve and 85 AH, 850 cranking amps.

So I didn't have ends for any of my wires yet because I didn't know what kind of battery post setup I was going to get. I went to 3 different closed stores before I got smart and started looking them up on my phone. they were all closed... :/
So i went back to the shop and cut my battery tray, cleaned and sanded my grounds and installed the battery.

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Thats when I decided to try my inverter with the toaster oven and blew the fuseable link.

I had traded fastivaca some nice bright LED reverse lights for taillight gaskets so after I cleaned up from fuse mess I installed the taillight gaskets. Thanks to the festiva store for making them for us and to fastivaca for sending them to me! they are awesome. In this photo is those LED's. 1200 lumens, 80 watts each. They really light it up behind you when you go to back up!

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Then I wired the gauges on my dash for power. Did them properly this time and wired their back lights into the headlight circuit. Then did some other wiring and discovered the issue with the factory wiring of the cigarette lighter described here:

- http://www.fordfestiva.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=59933

Its been a very hard decision for me to make weather or not I should keep my black carpet or get another one. A member here generously offered me one. I asked on facebook and the general consensus was use the black one, my wife says use the black one.... so I cleaned and then painted the spots the po had missed on the carpet. That took a ton of paint and was stupid, but Its all black now.

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Then while that was drying I heated up some of the sound deadener that i hadn't pressed in hard enough the first time and pressed it down again. By then the paint was dryish on the carpet so I threw it In the car. Let me know what your thoughts are of it. Im going with everything else grey, the carpet will be all thats black.

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Then I cleaned up the shop and put the car back outside.... Joys of not having a garage.

This week I bought my battery terminals/lugs/whatever; checked into this alternator wire and fusable links and almost have another rockauto order ready to go 130 items in my cart i think, lol. Once I figure out this banjo bolt deal I will order it. http://www.fordfestiva.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=59947

Today I brought the car In and finished installing the trailer wiring to the tow hitch. Got the proper screws, wires protected, glued up and zip tied.

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[william]

Progress is looking good.
I used a boby pin from my wife lol they make tools to remove them but the boby pin worked just fine

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[FestYboy]

Please tell me if i am understanding this correctly:

Im not the best at understanding these diagrams.
It looks to me like the battery feeds all 3 links on the strut side of the fuseable link panel. The alternator wire comes into the rad support side of the 'main' fuseable link.
So if i draw over 50 amps from the battery, the alternator will try to put out 50 amps and all of it will go through that one 'main' fuseable link to get from the alt to the battery.
It is fused for 25 amps even though the alt puts out 50 because there is nothing stock on the festiva that could draw over 25 amps.
Is that correct?
If so i think i should get a 50amp fuse and check the size of alt-to-fuse link panel wire to see if its large enough for 50amps.
(The toaster i want to use camping will draw 65 amps but it never was an issue on my other festiva for the fuseable link. Never felt the alternater wire though.)
Thanks

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I'm sorry I missed this post. You are correct in see that if the alt is maxed out and all the draw is from the toaster, the main fuse link will see most of that 50 amps and blow. To resolve this, you could tap the charge wire and feed it directly to the battery (or ad a second wire at the charge lug and feed to battery), this will allow the high current draw to bypass the fuse link when the inverter is in use. I feel that they are using the main link as a fuse for the alt and to me, this is wrong... The alt back feeds power through the main to feed the light and EGI links... To correct this, you'd want to feed on the battery side and with that, have the charge wire fused at just above max output (60A).

But I thought there was to be a secondary battery it be used for such power draw...?

[ryanprins13]

Poll question!
I installed a water temperature sensor for the gauge on my dash in the spot where the rad fan sensor was in the thermostat housing. So i need to come up with a different fan switch. I bought one on rockauto however the contacts on the thermostat are normally open and The oem fan switch is the opposite. So do I:

1) use the rockauto controller, Get a normally open relay, inline fuse and run properly sized wires off the battery to the relay to power the fan off this new circut?
2) use the rockauto controller, get a normally closed relay, smaller wires to it, output from the relay to the wire that used to go to the oem fan sensor.

3) use the ebay thing in the photo, splice it into my upper coolant hose and put the oem fan switch in it.



The probe from the rockauto one is 4 inches long and would have to go through both the radiator and the a/c condenser so the fan wouldnt hit it. Downside of using it is that its bigger, bulky, more wiring.
The downside of the splice in ebay thing is that i have to obviously cut my new upper rad hose and thats more potential leaks. Running a 16psi rad cap. I have to find it and see if it fits nice. I planned to have a manual fan switch on my dash working in parallel with the sensor.
Anyway, whats your opinions?

Progress is looking good.
I used a boby pin from my wife lol they make tools to remove them but the boby pin worked just fine

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Thanks! I will try that.

I'm sorry I missed this post. You are correct in see that if the alt is maxed out and all the draw is from the toaster, the main fuse link will see most of that 50 amps and blow. To resolve this, you could tap the charge wire and feed it directly to the battery (or ad a second wire at the charge lug and feed to battery), this will allow the high current draw to bypass the fuse link when the inverter is in use. I feel that they are using the main link as a fuse for the alt and to me, this is wrong... The alt back feeds power through the main to feed the light and EGI links... To correct this, you'd want to feed on the battery side and with that, have the charge wire fused at just above max output (60A).

But I thought there was to be a secondary battery it be used for such power draw...?

Thanks for getting back to me. I worry that if i run 2 wires more power will want to run through one than the other and the fuses wouldnt work properly. I ordered some fuseable links from rockauto. I plan to use a 50amp in there after I clean it, if it blows i will try a 60. If there are any signs of melting fusebox plastic or overload i will see what I need to get for a fuseholder and run that line directly to the battery with its own fuse.

I decided to put a small battery in the trailer that can handle the lights and stuff for at night so i can disconnect the car battery from it. There are enough wires from the car to the trailer to run the water pump and air pumps and so on, but not 75 or 80 amps like for a toaster. I have the inverter in the car wired to the car battery for a short 12v run. Then 10 awg wire with 120v going to the trailer in case i need it there.



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[william]

Now that I think about it I also went to a bigger battery when my system was in the car. This kept my fuse from blowing along with cleaning up the fuse block. I think this was to do with having more battery resurve when the amp was drawing hard.
The exta battery you where going to add should keep the fuse from blowing as well.

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