About 3 weeks ago my key warning buzzer stopped working. I though it possible the thing was old and worn out and needed replaced. Yesterday I was wiring up a cheap aftermarket stereo. When I temporarily stuffed the end of the power wire into the fuse box to get the stereo to come on to figure out what speaker wires went to what speaker…the key buzzer started working again. When I pulled the power wire out of the fuse box the key buzzer stopped. I’m running my own dedicated wires from the fuse box to the stereo…not using any factory wires. I have seen strange things happen when it comes to automobile wiring...but not this weird. My question is “How in the heck can this happen?” Other than the seatbelt over-ride switch was bypassed at some point in its life, the wiring isn't buchered up like you would expect from some old cars.
Hi Jeff, you did come up with a strange electrical problem. I'm guessing you glitched the voltages on the digital logic circuit, within the seatbelt interlock system, when you poked the hot wire in the fuse box...therefore resetting the logic. The various incarnations of the seats and seatbelt warning interlock systems, Ford starting putting in the Mavericks and Comets in 1973, were truly one of the biggest mandated boondoggles for these cars in my opinion. The seatbelt interlock system in the 1974 Mavericks used a "One-Shot" Momentary bypass switch from the Factory, located under the hood on the wheel well, in case the interlock was preventing you from being able to start the car. (yeah...unbelievable they would wire this junk in with the starting system) This logic circuitry probably used a D type Flip Flop, which is the "one shot" type, and therefore each time someone presses the momentary bypass switch, it will disable the seatbelt warning system only 1 time per sequence. There is a Ford wiring modification proceedure for permanantly bypassing this pain-in-the-neck feature...if it ends being that you need to do this. We might need more information to track this one down. So we can have you check for a few items if you want to investigate this futher.
I unplugged and removed the yellow box and under-seat wiring harness years ago. The seatbelt override switch under the hood had been modified to be bypassed when I got the car
Wow.....this is a strange one indeed. I wish I could fly down the Dixie Highway, with my Fluke meter, and give ya a hand in person Jeff. According to the schematic, if the Yellow Logic Module has been unplugged, and the override Modification has been done, then both leads of the Buzzer should be isolated from both a ground, and a power source right now. The Buzzer is in parrallel with the seat belt light, but both should still be isolated. If this keeps Buzzing, I would just unplug this "Ghost" Buzzer. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the seat belt warning buzzer, is the same as the "key" buzzer...the ONLY buzzer.
My buzzer works when it wants to. Seems like it's got something to do with the ign switch lock. You can jiggle it and it might work or it might not. Did you have your keys in when it started working? It might be like mine, and when you shook the car hooking or unhooking the wire, it was enough to change it. Or maybe the ground on the buzzer is bad, and the addition of a new ground to the radio caused it to work as long as the radio circuit had power. Just a couple of wild guesses......
Problem solved…The fuse wasn’t making a good connection with the fuse clip. It appears when I touched the stereo wire between the fuse and clip...it completed the circuit to send power to the buzzer.
Conductive Grease A very small amount of this http://www.google.com/products/cata...=X&ei=mhZtTujpKaHK0AGGh6jfBA&ved=0CEMQ8wIwAg# on the contacts might help.
