No Power from Steering Column

[phil1734]

Long time follower but this is my first post here -

I'm in the final stages of wiring my 818S and hit a snag like many. I had tail-lights, brakes, reverse, turns, and hazards working. Then when I went to start on headlights I had no power to the connector. Shortly thereafter, the taillights stopped working. Everything else is still okay.

In addition, the horns, and wiper motor don't seem to work. So steering column problem right?

Here's everything else I've traced down:
-All the fuses are good, even double checked them for continuity with a voltmeter.
- The DRL relay on the fuse block clicks when the stalk is turned to the first position (running/parking lights)
- The two headlight relays mounted together (one blue, one black) click when the stalk is further turned, but there's no power on either end of the high voltage line.
-I've played with the parking light switch, bypassing it and trying it on/off but no configuration seemed to change anything.

It seems that a few others here have had similar problems but nobody has posted a solution, either the thread goes cold or they don't follow up with a fix, so any help would be appreciated. The headlights and wipers are the last thing between me and a licence plate...

-Andrew

[phil1734]

Also forgot -

The instrument cluster dimmer doesn't work, and I still have the DRL and BIU hooked up.

Could this be a Body Integrated Unit issue? Any way to test those?

[AZPete]

Andrew, welcome and I'm impressed that you have come so far with only one post. I am not, I repeat NOT, an electrical guru like others on this forum. Hopefully a Guru will respond. But, when you said you bypassed the parking light switch I remembered the problems I had when I tried disabling the parking light switch. I wrote the following note, so if you did not disable the switch the right way maybe it's causing a problem.

Here's my note-to-self:
To disable the parking switch remove the phillips-head screw at the bottom of the steering column cover, pull the cover down to remove it. Look for a small square whitish connector and disconnect it. It is B69 in the wiring diagram. Either cut and connect the orange wire to the black/red wire or make a jumper to connect the orange and the black/red female pins. If you disconnect the B69 connector without connecting the orange and the black/red wires, the tail lights will not go on even with the headlights.

[Hobby Racer]

Also forgot -

The instrument cluster dimmer doesn't work, and I still have the DRL and BIU hooked up.

Could this be a Body Integrated Unit issue? Any way to test those?

This is a Body Integrated Unit issue. The BIU is responsible for the dash light dimmer.

[phil1734]

Thanks for the quick responses guys.

Does the BIU have anything to do with headlights/taillights though? It seems like the only thing it controls that we really "need" is the dash dimmer.

[K3LAG]

Check to be sure all of your grounds are connected.

[Loring]

I'm an electrical guru, but not, by any means, a Subaru guru.

If you haven't got this solved yet, do you have power coming into, and/or going out of the relay thats clicking? You'll need to check the 30 and 87 pins.

[phil1734]

Neither 30 or 87 had anything on either relay (the black and blue ones that are together.)

Unfortunately because of timing it looks like everything is coming out and going to iwire as I won't have time to play electrical run-around the next month. There goes the sticky tire and paint budget...

For purposes of educating myself and others, do you know what the next step would be Loring?

[phil1734]

55032

Here's a marked up diagram that I should have provided everyone with a few days ago. Red is no-good, green is working.

The switch seemed like the culprit but with the horn, wipers and clearance lights also out I gave up.

[904svo]

Made sure B71 pin 16 (B) is grounded. That ground operates the relays when switch is on.

[07FIREBLADE]

Sounds fun. Did you at least get the car running? You'll be in good hands and we will get you sorted out in no time.

[aquillen]

Don't know if it will help you or not. But read through thread #29 in Tamra's "Wiring Questions". That walks through some of circuit you posted in thread 9 above. It might give you a clue if we're both lucky today.

[phil1734]

B71 was grounded.

Car was running great and regularly go-carted for motivational purposes, just lacking in respect to most non-engine electrical issues.

Aquillen - I've been through that entire thread many times, don't even need to go check it again! I also have an 02/03 donor and looking a few steps ahead ran into further problems doing headlight wiring, as the new headlights are single bulb, single filament. It might be something to consider for your planned mega-diagram (a great idea by the way) that even if it's complete it still won't be representative of what you need to get working lights since you need to somehow make a circuit to splice in that switches them between high and low voltage, in addition to extra low voltage if you want DRLs.

[Loring]

B71-16 is grounded, but what voltage do you have there, and at B71-13?

[904svo]

Power for the headlights comes from MB2 #9 fuse (Red Lead). This supply power to the head lamps, the switch control grounds thru relays to operate the lamps.