86 22RE 4x4 Electrical Gremlins
02-20-2022, 12:42 PM
#1
Registered User
Thread Starter
86 22RE 4x4 Electrical Gremlins
Hey guys, Here to start fresh on my electrical gremlins.
1986 22R-E 4x4 Pickup
Built the truck two years ago. Slapped it all together as a cheap wheeler. Thing fired up strong. Ran great the whole time.
Ended up taking over daily duty. Started a new job and the 87 4Runner needed a break/bodywork.
Since day one of my new job, the truck has been acting up electrically. I started as a mechanical tech at a restoration garage an hour away. My toolbox lives there. I'm stuck in my driveway on weekends with basic hand tools and my meter.
Gonna rattle off the sequence of events in a short and sweet fashion. If anybody has some suggestions as to what is going on, fire off a reply and I'll have more for my brain to work on.
Was driving to work a few weeks ago. Truck died on the highway about a mile before my exit. Started to pull over and tried to crank. It fired right up. Pulled back out into my lane and got to work. Thing was fine all weekend.
The next week, the truck died on the way to work again. Seems my COR died.
There's a small Toyota junkyard at work so I got my boss's permission to yank a COR from an old wrecked 86 out back. Truck fired up and drove fine for a week.
Then out of the blue, it wouldn't get fuel again. COR wasn't kicking on.
The last three weeks I've been hot wiring the fuel pump from the diagnostic port to the battery.
While driving along, I noticed my radio/cig lighter/clock all seemed to be cutting out during the drive. I noticed this happened a lot when letting off the gas. Radio would die, clock would die, phone would stop charging, then immediately the radio would come back, clock would come back without losing time and the phone would beep that it was charging again. Put it on my "to do" list.
Kept turning my lights on in the morning to get no dash lights/tails and a weak buzzing noise from my taillight relay. I could snap the switch on and off a few times and tap the relay with my hand and the dash lights/tails would flicker to life.
Last week after a long day, I went to leave and the truck wouldn't start. No click from the starter relay. Had dash lights and the blower motor. But the starter wasn't turning. Ended up checking a few fuses in the kick panel to be sure of what was happening. Found my 15A EFI fuse melted almost into two pieces, but not blown. Popped the panel out and found the wires in the back looked pretty nasty. Cut them off the backside of the panel and spliced in an inline fuse holder I had in the "oh **** kit" and added the jumper wire from one side of the EFI fuse to the EFI relay- so its fully bypassing the burnt looking terminal.
Noticed the panel was heavily corroded. The stuff was like green Smartfood Popcorn growing out of my fuse holders. Spent a good hour cleaning out my terminals with a nifty set of terminal cleaners I keep in the glovebox. Ended up cleaning contacts up and trying the key. Finally it fired up and I got home.
On the drive home I noticed my turn signals were causing my battery gauge to dip with each blink of the signals. I had some guy come up behind me and flash his lights. Something was up. I pulled over and as I did my dash lights died and the taillight relay started buzzing again. I yanked the relay out and it was HOT to the touch. Let it cool down and shined my flashlight around under the dash looking for an obvious problem. Nothing apparent. Popped the now cool relay back in and got my lights back on.
Made it home and shut it down. Called my boss to take the next day out explaining my situation. Got up bright and early and pulled the panel off its mounts under the dash. Tried to use some small picks and jewelers screwdrivers to release my terminals from the panel and clean them up. None wanted to come free easily, so...in desperation I taped off my wires in groups and/or pairs and cut them. Brought the panel in and soaked it in a bowl of white vinegar for a bit. Had lunch and took a toothbrush to every terminal. Stripped the wire ends of all the pigtails I left and butt spliced some appropriately sized extensions onto each one to make it easier to splice the panel back in. Found one of the wires going to my tail lamp fuse (solid green with red bands) was melted pretty badly. A good inch of conductor was exposed and the insulation was melted away almost all the way around the wire. Cut this damaged section out and spliced in a longer pigtail to match the ones I already added to the panel.
Many freezing cold hours later, I had the panel wired back up, the wires were neatly run and bunched up by group, neatly wrapped in some slippery harness tape and zip tied into a nice stress-free loop. Reattached the panel and tried to fire the truck up. Nothing. Dash lights and blower are fine. No starter relay. No radio. No turn signals at all. No hazards. No dash lights or tail lights, no clock, no cig lighter and no battery gauge on the dash with the key on. So all that work to make it cleaner, but worse. Less things work now.
I'm stuck in a freezing cold driveway, trying to irritate my boss a month into a job I need with idiotic old truck problems. I feel like I'm making less progress and I'm thinking myself in circles. I'd really love to yank the whole harness out and inspect the whole thing, but its been so cold and snowy lately I'm not yet inclined to do it.
I need some spitball input so I can try and get the old rig patched back up. Thanks for any and all help, guys!
1986 22R-E 4x4 Pickup
Built the truck two years ago. Slapped it all together as a cheap wheeler. Thing fired up strong. Ran great the whole time.
Ended up taking over daily duty. Started a new job and the 87 4Runner needed a break/bodywork.
Since day one of my new job, the truck has been acting up electrically. I started as a mechanical tech at a restoration garage an hour away. My toolbox lives there. I'm stuck in my driveway on weekends with basic hand tools and my meter.
Gonna rattle off the sequence of events in a short and sweet fashion. If anybody has some suggestions as to what is going on, fire off a reply and I'll have more for my brain to work on.
Was driving to work a few weeks ago. Truck died on the highway about a mile before my exit. Started to pull over and tried to crank. It fired right up. Pulled back out into my lane and got to work. Thing was fine all weekend.
The next week, the truck died on the way to work again. Seems my COR died.
There's a small Toyota junkyard at work so I got my boss's permission to yank a COR from an old wrecked 86 out back. Truck fired up and drove fine for a week.
Then out of the blue, it wouldn't get fuel again. COR wasn't kicking on.
The last three weeks I've been hot wiring the fuel pump from the diagnostic port to the battery.
While driving along, I noticed my radio/cig lighter/clock all seemed to be cutting out during the drive. I noticed this happened a lot when letting off the gas. Radio would die, clock would die, phone would stop charging, then immediately the radio would come back, clock would come back without losing time and the phone would beep that it was charging again. Put it on my "to do" list.
Kept turning my lights on in the morning to get no dash lights/tails and a weak buzzing noise from my taillight relay. I could snap the switch on and off a few times and tap the relay with my hand and the dash lights/tails would flicker to life.
Last week after a long day, I went to leave and the truck wouldn't start. No click from the starter relay. Had dash lights and the blower motor. But the starter wasn't turning. Ended up checking a few fuses in the kick panel to be sure of what was happening. Found my 15A EFI fuse melted almost into two pieces, but not blown. Popped the panel out and found the wires in the back looked pretty nasty. Cut them off the backside of the panel and spliced in an inline fuse holder I had in the "oh **** kit" and added the jumper wire from one side of the EFI fuse to the EFI relay- so its fully bypassing the burnt looking terminal.
Noticed the panel was heavily corroded. The stuff was like green Smartfood Popcorn growing out of my fuse holders. Spent a good hour cleaning out my terminals with a nifty set of terminal cleaners I keep in the glovebox. Ended up cleaning contacts up and trying the key. Finally it fired up and I got home.
On the drive home I noticed my turn signals were causing my battery gauge to dip with each blink of the signals. I had some guy come up behind me and flash his lights. Something was up. I pulled over and as I did my dash lights died and the taillight relay started buzzing again. I yanked the relay out and it was HOT to the touch. Let it cool down and shined my flashlight around under the dash looking for an obvious problem. Nothing apparent. Popped the now cool relay back in and got my lights back on.
Made it home and shut it down. Called my boss to take the next day out explaining my situation. Got up bright and early and pulled the panel off its mounts under the dash. Tried to use some small picks and jewelers screwdrivers to release my terminals from the panel and clean them up. None wanted to come free easily, so...in desperation I taped off my wires in groups and/or pairs and cut them. Brought the panel in and soaked it in a bowl of white vinegar for a bit. Had lunch and took a toothbrush to every terminal. Stripped the wire ends of all the pigtails I left and butt spliced some appropriately sized extensions onto each one to make it easier to splice the panel back in. Found one of the wires going to my tail lamp fuse (solid green with red bands) was melted pretty badly. A good inch of conductor was exposed and the insulation was melted away almost all the way around the wire. Cut this damaged section out and spliced in a longer pigtail to match the ones I already added to the panel.
Many freezing cold hours later, I had the panel wired back up, the wires were neatly run and bunched up by group, neatly wrapped in some slippery harness tape and zip tied into a nice stress-free loop. Reattached the panel and tried to fire the truck up. Nothing. Dash lights and blower are fine. No starter relay. No radio. No turn signals at all. No hazards. No dash lights or tail lights, no clock, no cig lighter and no battery gauge on the dash with the key on. So all that work to make it cleaner, but worse. Less things work now.
I'm stuck in a freezing cold driveway, trying to irritate my boss a month into a job I need with idiotic old truck problems. I feel like I'm making less progress and I'm thinking myself in circles. I'd really love to yank the whole harness out and inspect the whole thing, but its been so cold and snowy lately I'm not yet inclined to do it.
I need some spitball input so I can try and get the old rig patched back up. Thanks for any and all help, guys!
02-20-2022, 02:00 PM
#2
Registered User
If you put the jumper in the test connector to run the fuel pump, and PLEASE don't drive it that way <shudder>, then you know there's another fuse box, sitting in the engine compartment. Especially considering that the test connector is on the side of the fuse block. Make sure that before you do ANY ohming on the system anywhere, you pull BOTH leads off the battery first. Any kind of voltage on an item you're going to ohm can blow the ohms part of your meter, or the fuse it contains.
Did you check the fuses in the engine compartment fuse block? With the meter, not your Mk. I eyeballs. Two of them, you need to remove the mounting bolts of the fuse box, and release the catch holding their part of the fuse block in with the rest. Lift them out, and the screws on the bottom are the place to test.
Did you check the fusible link between the battery positive and the engine fuse box? How about the fusible link between the alternator and the fuse box? The one that goes to the heavy bolt connector on the side of the alternator. I believe they label it Terminal B. It should read about +14VDC when the engine is running.
Fusible links are the seemingly very large wires with the thick, white, insulation. Disconnect one end, and ohm them out. Only way to know good/bad on them.
Also, clean the battery terminals and the connections on them. The ones Toyota likes to use, the thin metal circles, are lousy for resisting corrosion caused by lead/acid battery venting. I cut mine off, and put Marine Terminals on. They are the heavy lead terminals, with a single screw post sticking up from the back, with a wingnut on it to hold the wires down. Crimp a ring terminal onto the wires that go to them, and they slip on and off SO much easier, and give a much better connection. Cleaning them with a small, brass, wire brush is a piece of cake. They resist the vapors from the battery a lot better, too.
The corrosion you found on the cabin fuse block is probably caused by a leak of water above it. It's a know leaky spot. Look up behind the dash on the metal of the body above the fuse block. You'll most likely find a leak up there. You need to seal it tight. Check the other side as well. It might be part of the trouble with the COR. Again, known leaky area, and since the ECU is there, bad to have water going into the area.
Hope my rambling is some small help...
Pat☺
Did you check the fuses in the engine compartment fuse block? With the meter, not your Mk. I eyeballs. Two of them, you need to remove the mounting bolts of the fuse box, and release the catch holding their part of the fuse block in with the rest. Lift them out, and the screws on the bottom are the place to test.
Did you check the fusible link between the battery positive and the engine fuse box? How about the fusible link between the alternator and the fuse box? The one that goes to the heavy bolt connector on the side of the alternator. I believe they label it Terminal B. It should read about +14VDC when the engine is running.
Fusible links are the seemingly very large wires with the thick, white, insulation. Disconnect one end, and ohm them out. Only way to know good/bad on them.
Also, clean the battery terminals and the connections on them. The ones Toyota likes to use, the thin metal circles, are lousy for resisting corrosion caused by lead/acid battery venting. I cut mine off, and put Marine Terminals on. They are the heavy lead terminals, with a single screw post sticking up from the back, with a wingnut on it to hold the wires down. Crimp a ring terminal onto the wires that go to them, and they slip on and off SO much easier, and give a much better connection. Cleaning them with a small, brass, wire brush is a piece of cake. They resist the vapors from the battery a lot better, too.
The corrosion you found on the cabin fuse block is probably caused by a leak of water above it. It's a know leaky spot. Look up behind the dash on the metal of the body above the fuse block. You'll most likely find a leak up there. You need to seal it tight. Check the other side as well. It might be part of the trouble with the COR. Again, known leaky area, and since the ECU is there, bad to have water going into the area.
Hope my rambling is some small help...
Pat☺
02-20-2022, 06:59 PM
#3
Registered User
Thread Starter
yes, I know hotwiring the fuel pump isn't ideal at all. Been trying to engineer a fix on my time off, but every week that goes by it seems my problems multiply. Been freezing cold and/or snowing every weekend.
I'm fairly certain my fusible links aren't the culprit as the truck has been both running and charging fine. Had one of the FL's gone out on me I'd be fighting dead truck problems. I have power, but its limited. Seems to be an issue between the key switch and the feed to circuits in the kick panel/the COR trigger wire. I believe the issue is compounded by the scunned wire off the back of the tail light fuse, and probably some jank wiring going on with my radio harness.
Unfortunately I underestimated my issue this weekend and spent the relatively warm saturday wiring up a plug for a buddy's welder in his garage instead of buckling down on the old truck issues. House wiring is so much more enjoyable...
I'm fairly certain my fusible links aren't the culprit as the truck has been both running and charging fine. Had one of the FL's gone out on me I'd be fighting dead truck problems. I have power, but its limited. Seems to be an issue between the key switch and the feed to circuits in the kick panel/the COR trigger wire. I believe the issue is compounded by the scunned wire off the back of the tail light fuse, and probably some jank wiring going on with my radio harness.
Unfortunately I underestimated my issue this weekend and spent the relatively warm saturday wiring up a plug for a buddy's welder in his garage instead of buckling down on the old truck issues. House wiring is so much more enjoyable...
02-26-2022, 12:52 PM
#5
Registered User
Thread Starter
Solution
I fixed my electrical gremlins. Figured I'd post up the solution in case anybody wants to jot this down for their records.
1986 Toyota Pickup 22R-E, 4WD, M/T
Symptoms:
1. Lost power to Circuit Opening Relay trigger wire
2. Intermittent power failure on clock, radio and cig lighter circuit multiple times on a drive. Would shut off and come back on before dumping memory (clock/radio)
3. Tail light relay failing to contact properly. Relay would buzz and get hot before finally lighting up the dash and tail lights. Finally lost the circuit entirely.
4. Finally no click/no start and no power to cab kick panel fuse box.
5. No power to AM2 terminal on ignition switch
===Other than a partially melted EFI fuse which I suspect was a result of the RIDICULOUS corrosion issues in my panel before cleaning, I had no blown fuses in either the engine bay or cab.
I read and read and read about problems on AM1/AM2, ignition switch and panel wiring in the cab. No post exactly fit my problems so I had to build a composite plan from relevant pieces of other posts, forum write ups etc. Cross referenced it with my manual's wiring diagrams and started chasing.
Tore apart my dash and my engine bay fuse box. Tested everything from the battery to its termination point. Ended up losing power after the engine bay panel and before the ignition switch/cab panel.
THE PROBLEM ended up being a factory splice in the harness directly above the top mount for the cab fuse panel. Right where the harness splits up to the dashboard, down to the panel and forward into the firewall, the straight run towards the firewall has a bundle of wires that run along the driver side inner fender. In that bundle are four 8ga white wires. Three on the dash side, one running out to the firewall bulkhead seal. They are crimped together with a barrel crimp and wrapped in a thick roll of rubber tape. When I started peeling the tape back to investigate how cruddy my harness was, the crimp gave way with almost no effort and all four wires separated.
Stripped the wires for a new connector and found the ones dashboard side were all okay. Slightly cruddy, but okay. The feed coming from the firewall side was totally rotten copper for about eight inches. Ended up opening up the harness in the wheel well and cutting the wire back until I found clean copper, then I spliced in a new length of 8ga wire with a heat-shrink butt splice and adhesive lined heat shrink over it, and added a ring terminal on the far side. The wires were so large and short in such a confined space I ended up just crimping ring terminals on all of them and through bolting the whole thing with a clean new bolt and some fender washers, then wrapping them up in rubber tape and a layer of fresh harness tape, then zip tied the whole mess up and out of the way where it couldn't rub on anything and expose the new junction. Added a band of brightly colored tape with a flag to remind me to go back in the spring and replace it with something more permanent and professional. Now everything works and the truck fires up without sketchy jumper wires to power the fuel pump.
Also did the Ford Bronco starter solenoid swap, which is a breeze.
1986 Toyota Pickup 22R-E, 4WD, M/T
Symptoms:
1. Lost power to Circuit Opening Relay trigger wire
2. Intermittent power failure on clock, radio and cig lighter circuit multiple times on a drive. Would shut off and come back on before dumping memory (clock/radio)
3. Tail light relay failing to contact properly. Relay would buzz and get hot before finally lighting up the dash and tail lights. Finally lost the circuit entirely.
4. Finally no click/no start and no power to cab kick panel fuse box.
5. No power to AM2 terminal on ignition switch
===Other than a partially melted EFI fuse which I suspect was a result of the RIDICULOUS corrosion issues in my panel before cleaning, I had no blown fuses in either the engine bay or cab.
I read and read and read about problems on AM1/AM2, ignition switch and panel wiring in the cab. No post exactly fit my problems so I had to build a composite plan from relevant pieces of other posts, forum write ups etc. Cross referenced it with my manual's wiring diagrams and started chasing.
Tore apart my dash and my engine bay fuse box. Tested everything from the battery to its termination point. Ended up losing power after the engine bay panel and before the ignition switch/cab panel.
THE PROBLEM ended up being a factory splice in the harness directly above the top mount for the cab fuse panel. Right where the harness splits up to the dashboard, down to the panel and forward into the firewall, the straight run towards the firewall has a bundle of wires that run along the driver side inner fender. In that bundle are four 8ga white wires. Three on the dash side, one running out to the firewall bulkhead seal. They are crimped together with a barrel crimp and wrapped in a thick roll of rubber tape. When I started peeling the tape back to investigate how cruddy my harness was, the crimp gave way with almost no effort and all four wires separated.
Stripped the wires for a new connector and found the ones dashboard side were all okay. Slightly cruddy, but okay. The feed coming from the firewall side was totally rotten copper for about eight inches. Ended up opening up the harness in the wheel well and cutting the wire back until I found clean copper, then I spliced in a new length of 8ga wire with a heat-shrink butt splice and adhesive lined heat shrink over it, and added a ring terminal on the far side. The wires were so large and short in such a confined space I ended up just crimping ring terminals on all of them and through bolting the whole thing with a clean new bolt and some fender washers, then wrapping them up in rubber tape and a layer of fresh harness tape, then zip tied the whole mess up and out of the way where it couldn't rub on anything and expose the new junction. Added a band of brightly colored tape with a flag to remind me to go back in the spring and replace it with something more permanent and professional. Now everything works and the truck fires up without sketchy jumper wires to power the fuel pump.
Also did the Ford Bronco starter solenoid swap, which is a breeze.
Last edited by Peter Franklin; 02-26-2022 at 12:54 PM.
The following 2 users liked this post by Peter Franklin:
CamTom12 (02-27-2022),
RAD4Runner (02-27-2022)
02-27-2022, 11:46 PM
#6
Thanks for the update, Peter.
We appreciate it when people share what fixed their problem so others may learn from it / for quick reference in the future.
We appreciate it when people share what fixed their problem so others may learn from it / for quick reference in the future.
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