84 toyota van has no power (electricity) , nothing is working / no start

[84toyotavan]

hey everyone, im glad to see so many people who love these vans! well mine is the typical beater, 245K still runs. about a month ago it got stolen. i got it back last night. the battery so we put a jumper box and also used my brothers 5.0 mustang to try to jump it. that didnt work so i got a battery from my house from another car and that started it. i drove it home and parked it in the driveway. today i went to start it and it was dead. i saw the lights on the dash for a second. i figured it was the battery so i tried a couple different ones. they all have voltage but i am not getting any lights or power on the car at all. i checked the battery connections and they look good. i checked as many fuses as i could find. there was a wire next to the battery that connects together (its yellow), it looks like a fuseable link. the wires were twisted together on the connection of it. i put some electrical tape around it when i was putting the new battery in. i guess that was about the last time i had power to the car so Im guessing it is something there. i disconnected it and put in some wires with a 15 amp fuse in between but still no power... im going to look at that area again tomorrow but thought i should post here and see what you all think because maybe you could just tell me what the problem is ... haha... i read on here about the fuseable links and see that this is one. im not sure if what i used will work or not, i just dug up some stuff in some wire i have. it was for a speaker power wire (a red one) and the gauge wire looks about the same as the original wire coming from the car... but im thinking maybe i need to go to kragen and get a stronger type wire... am i going in the right direction? is there other stuff i should look for? whats the most common when this happens? any input will help, thanks!

[timsrv]

It sounds like a fusible link. Check the FL 1.25B fusible link 1st as that one is the most likely. Probably be a good idea to give them all a quick visual inspection. Use THIS THREAD to help identify them. You should also inspect the main battery cables on both ends to make sure the connections are clean & tight. Tim

[84toyotavan]

hi thanks for responding. the cables look good and tight. im guessing it has to be the fusible link because I am getting no power at all anywhere. im gonna go look at it in a little while, i guess it is tucked up there pretty good bc i was looking yesterday and didnt see it. where is the best place to get a new 1.25 FL? do i have to special order it or should any parts place carry something that will work? thanks!

[84toyotavan]

why cant i find the 1.25 FL ? im looking in front of the battery box behind the tire just like the picture shows but I dont see it anywhere. i see some wires going up to the engine but you cant pull them down. i am not seeing the 1.25 FL. i have a 1984 van. here is a video i put on youtube of what it looks like , can you tell me if it is there or not / what you guys think ? here is the link....

[kcg795]

By the battery, you will see a yellow connector plug. The wire connected to the battery terminal to that yellow plug IS the fusible link. That's how it's set up on the 84s. Mine was only held by two strands of wire. What I did was buy a fusible link wire from Napa and soldered it to the terminal in the yellow plug and put some heat-shrink tubing over it. Then I reinserted the terminal in the yellow plug and plugged it back into the harness and bolted the ring terminal to the battery terminal. My Van's currently connected to a small lawnmower battery and I haven't had to keep it on the charger and it starts every time now. No warning lights when I turn everything on either.

[84toyotavan]

hi i watched your video on it yesterday. so the 84 doesnt have the 1.25 FL that is in front of the battery box? and instead it is one inside the battery box? is that correct? i saw this yellow plug one, and that is what i suspect the problem is because it didnt look good and also i messed with it, but on the threads on the forum shows it as a different fusible link that lights up the christmas tree on the dash. is this for years after 84 only? my yellow plug one was also holding on by strands so I put some electrical tape around it before i put the battery back in. i didnt know it was a FL at the time, I just didnt want to have exposed wires. After I did this it didnt have any more power. Since then I have cut both sides of the caps off because I was trying to put a fuse in between with a FL I found in my garage from old wiring... or what I thought was a fusible link... it looks like one, but is actually from a stereo or something so i dont think that will work, or maybe it is the wrong gauge. whatever the case it was done late at night with what i had laying around and that didnt work at all haha. i plan to go to the store and get a FL wire like that and do what you did. I still have the old yellow cap and I left some wire on the back of it just incase... should i reuse that or just connect it back up with some other connections now that I cut it? thanks!

[timsrv]

Sorry but I don't have any 3Y vans & I sometimes forget there are differences. You are correct, the 84-85 vans do not have a 1.25B fusible link . They do have all the others though. Check the 2.0L which is part of the positive battery cable (see the last one listed in the fusible link thread). I don't think it's the .5G link as that one wouldn't make the van completely dead like you describe. If the 2.0 link is okay then check the links behind the power steering reservoir (particularly the yellow 60A one). When I say to check both ends of the battery cables I mean both ends of each cable. The negative cable goes from the battery post to sub-frame (beside the battery box), then it continues to the engine and attaches to the DS motor mount. Make sure the entire run of that cable is intact and all 3 attach points are clean & tight. If a visual inspection doesn't reveal anything, then check your battery with a volt meter or test light, then start testing down the big cable runs to be sure the voltage makes it all the way in & out of all the links. Tim

[kcg795]

What I did was pull the connector out of the yellow plug and yanked any strands I could out of the back with needle nose pliers so I can salvage it. I unbent the little grips that hold the wire in place and put the new wire and bent it back in place with pliers. Then soldered it in place. I don't have a soldering iron, so I use a blow torch. Seems to work quite well. Before I discovered it was hanging by two strands and before I got my stereo system stolen, my stereo would cut out when I'd hit the brakes. I also noticed the dash lights were glowing. So at about 60 MPH, I decided to turn the blower fan on full blast really quickly. The engine misfired when I did that. Just for temporary, I found some 18 gauge wire and spliced it in. It seemed to work a little better after that. I decided to beef up the wiring and add some redundancy like you see in the videos after it killed the last battery I bought for it not too long ago.

[84toyotavan]

cool thanks for the help guys. it sounds like the 2.0 one is the problem. It was working fine before I messed with it. Im sure it needed to be replaced anyway. I have not had any issues with the cars electrical system. i bought it for 400 bucks and have been driving it for a couple years. i have never had to change the battery or alternator so hopefully i wont have to. i do have the christmas tree going off most of the time but its because each of the warning lights is going off for a reason hahaha. i think i have had 4 out of 5 going off at one time and it was all accurate. still runs good but getting to the end / needs attention soon as i think it has a blown head gasket... honestly has probably had it since i got it about 8K miles ago. it has almost 246K on it now. i will look into the condition of it after i get it started again. it got stolen last month and i have only driven it home since then. it got hot really fast on me so im thinking there was no water in it or it is really blown worse now. it looked like it was blowing a lot more smoke than it used to when i started it up... but then again it probably hadnt started for about a month. well i will get the fusible link tomorrow and give it a try. i will probably be back with more questions down the line. thanks !

[84toyotavan]

i have another question. if i just put some wire and a fuse in between instead of a fusible link (i have lots of wires and fuses from cars i have parted out) , will that work? and also, what gauge wires should i use and what size fuse should i put? thanks!

[84toyotavan]

nm guys. i put some wire with a holder for a fuse and put a 30 amp fuse and everything works again. now i just have to charge the battery for a little while. thanks for the help!

[84toyotavan]

hey, when i connected the 2.0 link to the battery the car starts up now but i am getting the christmas tree on the dash now... the other side of the wire that was originally hooked up to the fusible link is still disconnected. where should i connect this to? or what should i do to get the lights to go off?

[timsrv]

Hook it back up the way it originally was. .5G link goes from battery to voltage regulator (inside the alternator) & 2.0L link goes from battery to the big wire off the alternator. That wire also feeds the FL box (behind the power steering reservoir).

[84toyotavan]

so both wires to positive cable then?? or something else? where was this thing getting power from before as it looks as if it was never hooked up directly to the battery?

[timsrv]

so both wires to positive cable then??

[84toyotavan]

cool thanks it works good now. i tightened up my bypass pipe that always gets loose. someone stole my catalytic converter a while back and they want like 300+ for a new one so... the old pipe i found in the back yard fit pretty good. i got a battery out of one of my other cars isnt in use and that seems to be working good. now it needs to be washed and vacuumed and tires rotated. got some wires showing on the front one after the joyride it got taken on. im going to just put it in the back since its not bad and only a problem on the outside... head gasket seems blown but still riding and looks like i will hit 246K soon haha. thanks for the help!

[kcg795]

I took a short video to show what wires are connected on my 84.