09 Expedition- random electric power loss
 

I had a strange occurrence happen saturday evening. I was patrolling in the county and I noticed my battery light had come on. I thought "hey Ill make it to the garage at the sheriffs office and take a look at her".

Well as I kept driving (about 25miles away from Sheriffs Office) I noticed my ABS, CEL also came on.
As I continued I decided to stop at the next "city" as I had lost all gauges and A/C and headlights were getting dim.
As I reached the edge of the "city" I lost all dash lights. I also noticed my transmission shifting in a strange manner.

I stopped there in lakeview at the cotton gin where they have lots of lights.
I checked all my fuses w/a test light and all tested good.
I then wiggled the red wire that runs from the alternator to the battery and noticed everything flicker. I shook that wire again and everything came back on.

I raced to the SO and parked my Exped. I had noticed that my dashcam had locked up and my battery was dead when I tried starting my Exped later that night.

I picked up my Exped today (had to jumpstart) to work on it before I go on duty and everything is working fine. No battery light, No CEL, etc.


I did find the insulation where the alt wire connects to the positive cable near the battery is dry and cracking and slightly corroded. I am going to tear into the exped tomorrow before I go on duty and will let yall know how it turns out....hopefully its just a loose battery cable.

Well it happened again tonight only this time it was en route to an accident...I looked pretty strange with my all my emergency lights on wiggling wires under my hood on the side of the hwy

Just a thought.... when they modified your Expy to be a "Patrol Vehicle" did they upgrade the alternator? I believe the ones for the SSV had larger alternators than the regular Expy's. Seeing as yours is an EB maybe all the extra electrical stuff is too much of a load.

Matt

Our mechanic found the issue. I had a bad ground (was able to pull it off of battery by hand) and it was causing all sorts of h$ll with my electrical system.

It corroded a few wires on the positive side. He cut out/replaced several wires and put new ends on the everything.
So far its been GREAT w/no problems at all.

I have always said that 90% of the electrical problems I have come across have been solved by fixing electrical grounds....here is another prime example

That's good to hear. Random issues are always a pain.