Electrical Incident

Exhibit A, Melted Fuse Holder

This should not have been a difficult trip.  We were going from the house to the monthly meeting at a restaurant 1/3 of a mile away and then back.  This was the first breakfast Kingsford had made it in several months (September?), due to the extended brake job / Ian being lazy.  The drive from the house to the restaurant was uneventful.  Kingsford started fine, and the short jaunt was uneventful with the new brakes holding their own (later adjusting would bring them into A+ form).

As always, breakfast was delicious with much discussion of old cars.  We stayed late to talk about an upcoming swap meet, and also have some discussion on proper Model A mechanical brake adjustment in the parking lot.  When the dust settled, it was only Mike (former club president you might remember from the wedding), and I.  I hopped into the drivers seat and tried to start the truck.  No dice.  I tried a couple more times, and still no signs of life.  Kingsford is usually pretty good about starting, and 0 signs of life means that the fuse has blown.  

It is salient to note that original Model As do not have fuses.  Given the rat's nest nature of the wiring, this is somewhat dangerous so most owners have subsequently installed them.  The most convenient location is somewhat obnoxiously downstream of the starter and upstream of literally everything else.  Short in the headlights? -- engine dies.  Short in the brake light? -- engine dies.  Short in the horn -- engine dies. And when the engine/ignition dies, everything else (wipers, horn, lights) goes with it.

So, you can check to see if the fuse is still alive by attempting to blow the horn.  I got a wicked weak horn blow that cut out after a second or two -- and subsequently wouldn't blow.  I have been bit by a blown fuse before, so I carry spares.  So, I grabbed a spare, hopped out, and opened the hood expecting to replace the blown fuse and be on my way.

Unfortunately, the fuse had not blown.  Or, maybe it had, but also the fuse holder had also completely melted.  As you can see in exhibit A, there should be additional plastic & a wire at the top -- not air and bubbly plastic.

Mike hadn't left the parking lot yet, so I flagged him down, and he came over.  Being that this was 1/3 of a mile away from the house, I hadn't tools or spares to speak of. Mike had his full kit, so with this help we spliced a new piece of wire in where the fuse was -- and luckily whatever had caused the original event was no longer making sparks.  Sadly, even with the electrical circuit complete, the car still showed no signs of life.  The distributor wire showed no signs of life when held near a head stud, so our next thought was that whatever electrical short there was may have killed the coil.  Mike didn't have a spare but I had one at the house, so we hopped in his Fordor & took a quick jaunt to the house where we picked up a new coil.  Back at the restaurant, the new coil went in, & still there were no signs of life holding the distributor wire next to a head stud.  Having nothing to lose, we decided to try starting it anyways.  To my great surprise, it started -- and I limped the 1/3 mile home with Mike in tow.

I subsequently discovered that the timing was waaaay off, which may have been a contributing factor.  Still have no idea why the fuse holder melted to begin with.  I also later found a short in the headlight bucket, but that shouldn't have caused a short while the headlights were off....