need electrical help

[gbell]

Yesterday I went to start my X and she won't start. It kinda seemed like a dead battery, but my lights were really bright and everything electrical worked fine, it just won't start. It seemed like the starter could quite get enough juice to start it.

This morning when I went to get the battery out to charge I figured I'd try starting one more time. This time she started just fine. And I just tried start here again to make sure she's fine and she started fine again.

I think that some moisture prabably affected the electrical system somewhere, cause its really rainy during this time of year in Oregon. I don't know where to start to try and prevent this.

OH, by the way, I noticed that the dinging noise the sounds when you leave the door open and the keys in the ingnition was also affected somehow. It won't make the noise unless the lights are on. Pretty weird.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Robb]

I would suggest putting new battery cables on. They are pretty infamous for going bad on 1st gen Explorers and when they start going bad, they can give you all kinds of trouble.

Robb

 

[Crankcase]

The door chime is turned on via the igntion switch....It may be going bad on you. That could also cause the no-start condition...

 

[jgilbs]

like morissey said try new cables, but also if the terminals themselves are corroded, then this can cause there to be too much resistence from the battery and not enough juice to start the car. to clean the terminals, use a paste of 3 parts Sodium BIcarbonate(Baking soda) to 1 part water and use this to scrub the corrosion from your terminals. Be sure that the terminals are disconnected when you do this.

 

[slow-demon]

I also agree with changing the battery cables. Or at least the batt terminal ends on the pos and neg cable ends.

 

[Runnin'OnEmpty]

Also check the negative battery cable where it connects to the engine block. A loose connection here causes all kinds of electrical trouble, and is easy to overlook.