quick and safe electrical test,..

Hi : Need a electrical refresher and some advice/comments etc-
I have the engine completely removed and have finished some re-wireing under the hood -I am thinking of doing a quick test of the system by hooking up the ol 12 volt battery-Was wondering if I ground the end of the negative battery cable to someplace on the frame and the postive battery to the fuse box I'll be okay-
.......Will this work to check the lights,instrument panel.etc?-TIA

Not the way I would do it. If you have a short you have a fire. I would use a multimeter to do a contenuity test on all the circuits you redone.

Go for it!
It wouldn't cause a fire as long as you don't over load any fuses, and don't feed any fuel.
If you have to test the fuel pump disconnect the circuit first and test with a meter.

good luck

Yeah continuity check em. Hooking up a battery is a pretty bad idea, even though it most likely wont start a fire, its just asking for trouble.

scoobyxj said:

Not the way I would do it. If you have a short you have a fire. I would use a multimeter to do a contenuity test on all the circuits you redone.

Click to expand...

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Thanks for the advice -Well I don't have a multimeter immiedately handy and the gas tank has also been removed sometime ago I'll be going out to the local Radio Shack or something and maybe shopping and purchaseing a multimeter although I'm thinking the real probability of a electrical short or fire can be reasonably managed on this short test basis-
Thanks again all for the real world input and advice-
bxj

You could always put a 30A circuit breaker inline on the power or ground at first connection time- of course don't have anything that pulls many amps turned on like radiator fans, HVAC fan, starter etc. But even if you do draw too many amps it'll just open the breaker for a minute, no harm done.