- Location
- Harrisburg, NC
All started about three weeks ago. I was headed out of town on a 3 hour trip, got around the corner from where I left and looked down to see my volt meter pegged to 19 and the check gauges light on. Pulled over and re-started the Jeep, problem solved. No more issues until about a week and a half ago. Started having some cool/cold starting problems. Jeep would crank fine, and as soon as it caught it tried to cut back off...really low idle. It never did stall, and after about 5-10 seconds it picked itself up and all was well. Didn't do this every cool/cold start...maybe half the time.
Well tonight I go to run some errands, after driving it this morning with no issues. I start the Jeep, and as soon as it fires it runs for a fraction of a second and stalls right back out. At this point the instrument panel and everything else electrical went dead. No lights, no radio, no gauges...nothing. I try to turn the ignition back on again and still nothing. What I did notice was while the ignition was in the OFF position, the radio would come on about 1/4 power and flicker. When the ignition was in the ON position, the radio would go OFF and the brake light would very faintly come on (my e-brake was on). A little ass-backwards no? Opening the door would kill everything (or what little bit I actually had).
I got out of the Jeep and was going to get my tools out of the back to unhook the battery and see if that did anything. I get out and happen to glance back in to see my dome light come on and everything come back to life. Turned the ignition on, dash lit up like normal, I noticed my radio presets were gone and my trip-meter had reset. Tried to crank the Jeep and it wouldn't fire...just sit there and crank, so I knew the computer lost it's memory and eventually the idle would come back, with some help (been down that road before when i've had batteries go flat on me before).
After about 5 minutes the idle was back and everything was good to go. Drove around for a couple of hours since and all is well. The true test will be tomorrow morning once it's had a chance to settle down.
All my battery connections are relatively new (less than 1 year) and pretty much spotless. All my cables were upgraded by myself and a friend to 2 and 4 gauge (welding cable actually). If it acts up again in the morning i'll be cleaning my connections just to be safe.
In case you've never had to get a late model XJ (or vehicle for that matter) going when the computer doesn't have a memory, it goes about like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5OyrakCNBw
I tried to get a video of the radio spazzing out, but there wasn't enough light for my camera to pick it up on my phone.
Anybody been down this particular road before? I'm all ears to suggestions!
Well tonight I go to run some errands, after driving it this morning with no issues. I start the Jeep, and as soon as it fires it runs for a fraction of a second and stalls right back out. At this point the instrument panel and everything else electrical went dead. No lights, no radio, no gauges...nothing. I try to turn the ignition back on again and still nothing. What I did notice was while the ignition was in the OFF position, the radio would come on about 1/4 power and flicker. When the ignition was in the ON position, the radio would go OFF and the brake light would very faintly come on (my e-brake was on). A little ass-backwards no? Opening the door would kill everything (or what little bit I actually had).
I got out of the Jeep and was going to get my tools out of the back to unhook the battery and see if that did anything. I get out and happen to glance back in to see my dome light come on and everything come back to life. Turned the ignition on, dash lit up like normal, I noticed my radio presets were gone and my trip-meter had reset. Tried to crank the Jeep and it wouldn't fire...just sit there and crank, so I knew the computer lost it's memory and eventually the idle would come back, with some help (been down that road before when i've had batteries go flat on me before).
After about 5 minutes the idle was back and everything was good to go. Drove around for a couple of hours since and all is well. The true test will be tomorrow morning once it's had a chance to settle down.
All my battery connections are relatively new (less than 1 year) and pretty much spotless. All my cables were upgraded by myself and a friend to 2 and 4 gauge (welding cable actually). If it acts up again in the morning i'll be cleaning my connections just to be safe.
In case you've never had to get a late model XJ (or vehicle for that matter) going when the computer doesn't have a memory, it goes about like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5OyrakCNBw
I tried to get a video of the radio spazzing out, but there wasn't enough light for my camera to pick it up on my phone.
Anybody been down this particular road before? I'm all ears to suggestions!