Smokin' Wire !

[adyc]

Just had to be recovered home after burning smell materialised whilst driving. I found the problem - as per attached image - the small fuse box located just in front of the battery.

 

The top black wire has clearly started to burn - I was unable to ascertain why.

 

Can someone assist with what it is / what it is there for? I'd prefer to replace this myself but am worried that just replacing it might not solve the problem of why it happened in the first place.

 

I'm fingers crossed for it being just a worn wire rather than anything worse - I'd sure appreciate some input from someone with greater knowledge than myself.

 

Thanks in advance ....

[daddyfixit]

a common fault; have been threads about it before on here as well.

 

mine went a few months ago, used to get the plastic burning smell of a morning when first starting the car. same wire had done same damage to fusebox and the lid. caused by high resistance/poor contact under the terminal-it had burnt away the fuse underneath and left a thin strand of fuse in place!!

got one from fords (

[chrispb123456]

Hi

Looks like there's been a problem there before as the black wire should be connected the same way as the wires below, connecting in that way will have bypassed the fuse, this was probably done as a temporary fix thats been left.

[seatkid]

Its actually the crimp on the heavy wire that fails. You need to change the wire or somehow fix the crimp - some people have put on a new crimp or soldered the existing crimp - after removing and cleaning the old crimp and cutting the wire back to fresh copper. A new fusebox is also required as the connection is burnt and now oxidised and high resistance. Edited September 9, 2011 by seatkid