Service Start System??????

[Ronzuki]

Well done! You've learned a valuable lesson:

I always plug stuff like that in before I start the car (power off). Then, everything in the car powers up at the same time.

Every time a fuse blows there's a surge...surges = very bad for electronics. Some of that surge makes it through before the fuse clears the fault. If it happens enough, some weaker, or aged, electronics will 'mysteriously' fail later on.

I stand by my earlier staements and comments. Many, many years of industrial field troubleshooting work to back it up.

As to the comment of electronics have to be robust, very true...but....should be robust and profitable are not synonymous in the world any longer. Robust enough to make it out of warranty, yes. After that profits rise as was indicated above by elevated diagnosis charges and incredibly over-inflated prices for the mysterious black boxes.

I had to throw a lousy 2 year old toaster away recently because the circuit board controlling an electro-magnetic latch in it wouldn't hold the lever down. What did we do? Pull out the nasty looking 20+ year old toaster we still had and are now using it again.

[murcod]

Well done! You've learned a valuable lesson:

I always plug stuff like that in before I start the car (power off). Then, everything in the car powers up at the same time.

Every time a fuse blows there's a surge...surges = very bad for electronics. Some of that surge makes it through before the fuse clears the fault. If it happens enough, some weaker, or aged, electronics will 'mysteriously' fail later on.

I stand by my earlier staements and comments. Many, many years of industrial field troubleshooting work to back it up.

As to the comment of electronics have to be robust, very true...but....should be robust and profitable are not synonymous in the world any longer. Robust enough to make it out of warranty, yes. After that profits rise as was indicated above by elevated diagnosis charges and incredibly over-inflated prices for the mysterious black boxes.

I had to throw a lousy 2 year old toaster away recently because the circuit board controlling an electro-magnetic latch in it wouldn't hold the lever down. What did we do? Pull out the nasty looking 20+ year old toaster we still had and are now using it again.

Ron, you must cringe every time you push that "Start/ Stop" button on the Kizashi dashboard- because that's one mega current surge you're unleashing with every start! Not to mention the voltage fluctuations through the entire vehicle's electrical system from the battery being under a sudden and huge load.

[sx4rocious]

When I was 19, i owned a car audio shop. In building my show system for the shop, I built it in the only car I had available at that time: a 1994 Saturn SL4. (done laughing yet?)

The car had a measley 75 amp alternator. I added an interstate battery under the hood to drive the car, and two US AMPS solid state SPL1000 series batteries in the trunk with an Orion MBR-70 multi battery regulator to assist in the charging duties. The MBR-70 was to insure that all three batteries recieved a constant and even charge to avoid any electrical problems associated with a multi-battery system and a stock alternator. This was a great set-up and everything was wired to perfection with 0 AWG wire and VERY expensive connectors, distribution blocks, and fuses.

I thought this would be sufficient, and for the most part, it was. That is until I started having issues with the high current prototype Soundstream amplifier I was running the subwoofers with...

At some point, the amp's capacitor bank (I'm guessing this was what happened) surged and backflowed into the car's electrical system. I couldn't begin to guess what kind of voltage the surge actually was, but it fried the Interstate battery and the stock alternator. Oh, the $1,000 dealer cost amplifier I waited two years to be built was a casualty also....

After a VERY expensive trip to the stealership in town, I had my car back for about 6 months and around 6K miles, when the alternator committed suicide again. This time it blew a main fuse therefore saving the life of the brand new $1800 replacement Orion amplifier.

i "got smarter" this time and went for a custom spun, 150 AMP alternator that I had built for the bargain price of around $750 (GULP!). THANK GOD it came with a great warranty, as about three months later, it sent itselft and ANOTHER Interstate battery to the electronics heaven. By this time, I had given up on the car audio profession as a whole, and replaced all the components in the car with slightly-better-than-stock coaxls and CD player, and just drove it for another few months until the 150 AMP professionally installed an built custom alternator when out again!! This time I took it back to the shop that built it. After days of testing the car, they came to the conclusion that whatever caused the initial surge had caused so much damage that the car's electrical system will never be fully repaired aside from replacing everthing from the computer to the wiring harness....

Needless to say, they replaced the alternator again and I traded it for an equally embarassing Ford ZX2....

Morale to the story, I believe RonZuki..... Electrical gremlins are impossible to fully repair....

[murcod]

It's no wonder you had issues after doing all that to the poor car.

[sx4rocious]

Funny thing is, I actually did all that to the electrical system so I WOULDN'T have issues with the electrical system!!

BTW, I did place 3rd in the 1996 IASCA midwest finals pro class. I competed in the sound Q+ category with an RTA score of 33, and a SPL score of 156.1 Db. LOL

[Ronzuki]

It's no wonder you had issues after doing all that to the poor car.

In a nutshell, that is, and has been, my point in numerous posts with modern day cars and all of the high tech junk controlling everything. Any modification (and yes, plugging things in to the cigarette lighter becomes a modification) can cause problems.

Murcod...I actually do cringe when I push the start button. Occasionally weird crap happens, from nothing to cranking and not firing. I have now idea why other than there's far too much tech between my finger and the flywheel rotating.

[SamirD]

OK, it was a very long weekend for the Kizashi, but I tackled the problem head on. This was the result:

I already spoke of my wife's trip to the nearest Autozone, and the interesting lack of computer error codes. She also stated that they pulled the fuse in the Main interior fuse-block labeled "RADIO" and found it to be functioning properly.

Monday afternoon, we took the car into the nearest import dealer (Nissan, as the nearest Suzuki dealer is well over an hour away and the Nissan dealer has a good reputation for import mechanics in this area) and while the oil was being changed, I asked the service manager to have one of the techs check it out. I imformed him that if it looked very difficult, or if we got into diagnostic time, that I would take the hour trip and have it serviced at Suzuki. His tech checked the passenger-side fuse marked "AUDIO" and the one under the hood for the ignition. Both were found to be in working order and the tech decided to stop searching.
By this time, I was begining to grow weary and tired of the issue, so I called Suzuki in Bloomington Indiana to set up an appointment. BTW, the Suzuki tech seem overly anxious to price gouge me on service also, as he was twice as much for Diagnostics than the Nissan dealer wanted to charge....

Tuesday morning I had a couple hours before our guests started arriving for the evening festivities, so I decided to give the Service Manual another go to see if I missed anything. I took another approach this time, and went out to the car and tried all the electrical systems in it to see what worked and what did not. This was the result:

1. No audio
2. No power mirrors
3. No seat memory (power seats worked, but no memory)
4. "SERVICE START SYSTEM" code still on
5. No temp in the dash display
6. Either if the 12V power outlets

I then cross-referenced this list with the electrical schematics in the service manual to see if there was a simple common denominator. About an hour of listing all the fuses and relays involved with each of these systems, there was one simple common denominator.....

The fuse in the driver side block labeled "ACC"......

Given the console 12V power outlet also failed, I checked the "ACC2" fuse and also found it blown. My guess is that when my wife plugged in the DVD unit, the unit was still in the "ON" state. This must have created a surge in the system much like plugging in the vacuum when it is on. Lesson learned there! I also had no idea the start system would be linked to an accessory fuse causing it to start thowing error codes, but still function as designed. Needless to say, I unhooked the battery completely while "performing exploritory surgery" and the errors were off upon restarting the vehicle.

The results:
1. Happy Kizashi!
2. Saved a bunch of $$$
3. Forever endebted to the poster of the Service Manual, and
4. ONE HAPPY WIFE!!!!!

SUPER!!!! Congrats!! And you're wiser and richer for the experience (since you didn't have to shell out to the Suzuki dealership).

This experience is why I typically run to the factory service manual and a good forum before I think about calling anyone. In just a few hours, I can know more than the tech working on the car, and I save some serious money. Even if solving a $200 problem costs me 4 hours, It's still $50/hr that I just paid myself.

Case in point is the tpms winter set of tires. The local place wanted $1700 for these and tire rack was $1100--without the re-learn. Right now I'm in it for under $1000 and that's including stronger factory wheels and the re-learn tool. And I know much more about tpms than I ever thought I would.

[murcod]

In a nutshell, that is, and has been, my point in numerous posts with modern day cars and all of the high tech junk controlling everything. Any modification (and yes, plugging things in to the cigarette lighter becomes a modification) can cause problems.

Murcod...I actually do cringe when I push the start button. Occasionally weird crap happens, from nothing to cranking and not firing. I have now idea why other than there's far too much tech between my finger and the flywheel rotating.

There's a BIG difference between plugging a DVD player into the cigarette lighter socket and totally rewiring the charging system of a car- installing a competition sound system with modded alternator, huge amps, capacitors etc!

The DVD player obviously has some issues and blew the fuses. No harm done, the fuses did their job.

[Woodie]

No harm done, the fuses did their job.

Here's the thing, that's the important bit.

I'm just confused as to why it took a week.

[Ronzuki]

The fuses did their job to prevent constant over-current draw and prevent the wiring from melting and potentially starting a fire, period. Probably a high amp rating (with relationship to the normal circuit's full load draw) fast acting type in this case. The fuse did absolutely nothing to arrest the surge and prevent it from entering the electrical system...that's what surge suppressors are for and there are many, many application specific versions of those out there. I'd bet there aren't any in the car (they are generally expensive). I'm not talking about the once and done outlet-strip jobbies from office max here. We no longer design them in to our controls simply because of that cost. If it isn't a requirement in a spec, it doesn't go in. If I want to win bids, I have to play low ball and go cheap like everyone else. Maintenance a year down the road (replacing dead components) is not my concern. Auto manufacturers are no different. It's not the right thing to do, but there you have it. There are many different types of fuses for many different purposes, Fast blow, time-delay, ultra-fast, etc.....simply based upon their cost alone, automotive fuses are general purpose (no fires due to wires melting from over current). There's far more to fuses than the average person would ever want to comprehend. see mersen.com, bussman.com ot littelfuse.com

Yeah, the fuse blew...all is working, for now. The question is for how long? Maybe forever, maybe not. And, if something fails down the road, who's to say that one time surge wasn't the ultimate culprit.