Relay Or Fuse Problem

[Mark Elder]

Hi, This evening went to flash my rear fog at driver with no lights and I realised instead of the rear-fog warning light on the dash I got the VSC/TRC warning light (and it stayed on!).

When I'm driving (ie ignition on) the VSC/TRC warning and the non-functioning rear-fog are the only faults I've found, but when ignition off:

No central locking

No alarm

No interior lights

Clock on dash resets itself to 1am (every time I turn on ignition)

As this combination does not seem to match a fuse (not checked them yet because it's dark!) - I suspect a relay has gone.

Anyone seen this problem before or any ideas?

[Mark Elder]

Just an update:

Had a look at a possible cause - recently fitted tow bar (fitted by well know German firm with outlets all over UK) - can't believe it - cable for electrics only 2mm from rear exhaust box - melted through!

I cut the cable and insulated it car-side of the damage. Will be going have words with them.

But electrics did not "recover" itself so dropped into dealer to run a diagnostic test. They found and fixed the fuse (but by time I collected car they'd forgotten which one it was!)

[bothwell_buyer]

not encountered this one although have had a couple of weird faults on the electrics.

Theres a couple of electronic geeks on the forum who may look in, but in the meantime I guess checking fuses is a simple task. Relays - again can be checked but more effort involved but with the 4.2 models onwards, I think the online manuals give much more info - what you need to be doing is associating the link between the devices.

In the good old days, when you had something like this, normally it was a faulty earth.

Hope you find the bug soon!

[bothwell_buyer]

ah - good - you beat me to it!! I posted just before yer update - haha.

[luke4x4tech]

As it was the tow bar wires it could have blown the dome 15amp fuse but because when the wires melted togeather they will share earth and power and back feed each other not to mention giving a power sorce to the exhaust system and then to the engine ..... hence powering up the earth giving you a right headache . hope this helps.

quick eg ... putting a single filament lamp in a twin lamp holder ( side light, stop light ) when you put your brake lights on the side lights will glow aswell due to the back feed of power .