tetraguru

O.K. I picked up my '88 GXL about six months ago. Apparently the previous owner had a mini t.v. and stereo setup and at some point it was stolen from the car. So when I got it what was left of the intrument panel was a nice hole, loose head unit with wires and the remenants of XM.
There were of course some things wrong with the car :
passenger window doesn't work - think the motor is beat
climate control only worked on max if it felt like it at all - no AC at all
the shifter needs new bushings and maybe syncros

When I would drive around and if I so much as touched the brake pedal this quick surge would hit anything elctronic, radio, cig lighter, dash, headlights and dim or turn off for less than a sec and come back, or at full stops would stall about 5% of the time. At the same time when she's running good it's sweet.
The biggest thing that gets me is it'll act up when I drive around not touching anything and with nothing on, day or night, rain or shine(although she acts up like a SOB when it's wet out) - and even when the car is off sitting in a driveway.
When it was working the voltage meter would be practically on 16, that caused me to go through 2 altinators.


I end up replacing the stereo with my old Alpine, used the existing wiring for my amp and sub. That works perfect. My electronicly inclined friend took out my climate control and found 2 burnt out diodes and replaced them, so at least now I have really hot air but again only on max, still no AC - but I think it may need to be recharged anyway.

Please Help the Haynes manual olny helps taking it apart.

Long wasn't it....sorry had to get it all out in one shot....seriously.......HELP

Icemark

Sounds like a bad alt or bad wiring to the alt if you are getting 16 volts at any point. Anything over 15 volts can cause damage. Also the surge down when hitting the brake is a classic example of a bad alt and a TPS on the edge of needing adjustment.

As far as the passengers window, it is very very very very rare to have a problem with the motor, and in 99.999999% of the time it is a bad drivers power window switch or occasionally a bad passengers power window switch.

tetraguru

The last time I had brought it to my mec. he replaced the altinator and adjusted the idle...it didn't really make much difference but after 2 weeks of continued surging it simply stopped and was working perfect. This contuned for about 3 weeks and then one day started acting up again - the only clue there is weather patterns, but that's nuts

tetraguru

I checked a theory ---- The brake light relay switch under the dash. I unclipped it and did everything that would nomally make the short act up, and nothing happened (that's good).
I wanted to know how can I tell what part is exactely the problem, if it's the wire or the relay or the lights....wha ?