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1996 camaro 6 cyl goes dead

846 views 5 replies 3 participants last post by  dnult 
#1 ·
I have a 1996 6cyl. The car will just go dead. No lights- no start. I touch the positive and neg poles of the battery and power returns - any ideas on where to start?
 
#2 ·
Sounds like a battery connection is getting knocked loose?? Give us some more info on your problem though!
 
#3 ·
The Battery posts are Tight, Clean and Shinny - Battery never goes dead - just the entire electrical system shuts down.
Also not throwing any error codes. Leads to alternator, plastic box and post on fender also cleaned. Any ideas where else to go?
 
#4 ·
i have a 1996 6cyl. The car will just go dead. No lights- no start. I touch the positive and neg poles of the battery and power returns - any ideas on where to start?
sounds like the battery itself is bad if thats all you do and the power comes back?? The posts are broke inside the battery??
 
#6 ·
...I touch the positive and neg poles of the battery and power returns...?
I hope you're not touching the positive and negative poles together :eek:

Sounds like a classic bad connection despite what new parts may be in there. My 2002 Z28 just went dead one day the moment I turned it off. No lights, no cranking - nothing. I went under the hood and measured between the battery (-) and chassis ground - turned on the key and saw nearly zero volts (good). I did the same test between the battery (+) and a large positive stud near an under-hood fuse panel. This time I saw anywhere from 2 to 6 volts (bad). I was loosing voltage in a bad connection.

Turned out the positive cable clamp had develped a bad connection (fall-out from a former leaky delco battery no doubt). I buffed up the clamp and reinstalled it and it's been working fine every since.

I've seen plenty of lead clamp cables develop a bad connection between the lead clamp and copper wire.

Best advice is to get a digital volt meter and find out where your 12V is getting lost. Using a voltage drop test like I described above, you should be able to verify the integrety of all the wiring and connections in the power circuit. It's either bad wiring or a bad battery.
 
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