Fuse blows in 2000 neon

[das2123]

Originally Posted by Dare-Wreck

This sucks, this and a left turn signal are the only two things preventing me from driving... Im so aggrevated...

Check all your grounds. I know its a PITA, but make sure they are connected securely.

[welsch89]

i have a 95 plymouth neon sport and my car keeps doin the same thing except in the morning when its cold i can drive bout 20 miles to a different town then i can drive back home and about 1 miles away from my house after i get off the highway it shuts down and burns out the fuse then i can throw in another fuse and make it the rest of the way home then next morning its fine until like its getting hot after the first fuse blows you have a little bit and then it will break down and just keep popping fuses right when you put them in until the next morning when its cool i donno it kinda sounds different from the others but what should i do or should i first check the wire harness...thanks brad

[snshnhottie]

Originally Posted by das2123

Check all your grounds. I know its a PITA, but make sure they are connected securely.

My car just started doing this a month ago. I explained that the wiring might be a problem to the garage I took it to, but they said they couldn't find it unless the car shorted again. So their nice fix was just replacing the fuse and giving it back to me. Is there any way I can look for the wires myself?

[das2123]

^^^Sure you can, you just need to trace ground wires and inspect them for fraying or damage.

[KimMG]

Use a wiring diagram. Make an enlarged copy of the wiring diagram and highlight the affected circuit. Check off areas of the wiring and components as you check them.

[myneon13]

I had the sme problem w/ my 2nd gen neon. If any thing it could be a power wire touching ground or it could be thr coil pack connectors.

[patarusky]

How would the coil pack connectors cause this problem???My 2000 is very random with this fuse thing. Sometimes I can go 2 weeks without a hitch. When it does blow it's not mis-firing or anything.Gotta be somebody out there who had this fixed.

[accord_rokr]

ok man, I believe I have a solution to your problem...
my wife has a 2005 Neon SXT and her mother wrecked it, in doing so she had to get the whole computer control reinstalled and all that junk. Go out to your neon, look under the car itself, on the driver side in the front. Look there you will see what is called a heatsink, and behind it will be all sorts of wires connected in the back. If you have run over a curb or whatever in the last few trips, you pushed this device against your oil pan, causing it to ground out and shoot any and every fuse that is associated with the posi. and negi. components that are touching the pan. This device is secured by two screws on both sides at the upper part. Take your hand, grab ahold of the device on the bottom, and pull it towards the front of your car in an upwards angle as it allows. Replace it to its original resting place, and when you have done that, secure those screws again tightly. To finish up, take some electrical tape and seal off any wire connectors that have any sign of a naked appearance. If you do not do this, water could also shoot the fuses in the future, and may possibly short your system out. Do not quote me as this is what it will be on your car, I just know that this is the way it is on the 2005. But I am sure, that it is like this. Hope this helps! Let me know!
Good luck!

[umbluegray]

I know this is an old thread but it helped me tremendously.

My wife's uncle recently gave us his 2000 Dodge Neon. As I was driving it home the engine died. My wife found this thread.

After checking, yes, the #10 fuse (15 amp mini) had blown. I replaced the fuse and all was fine.

Until it blew again. And again. And again ad nauseum.

This past weekend my father came over and we started looking around for the wire mentioned in one of the previous posts.

We found two wires that appeared suspect. Because we fixed both wires I can't say for sure which wire had been causing the fuse to blow.

First, there was a small wire on the passenger side of the motor under the top radiator hose. We had to lift the radiator hose as much as possible to allow me enough room to work my had down behind the radiator in front of the block. And the wire was just out of reach.

The wire had a bare spot about 2 inches long and you could see that the two ends had been twisted together. One end of the wire ran down underneath the motor. We crawled under the car (after jacking up the front end) and found the wire in question. Using about 8 inches of split wire flex tubing we were able to put the wire inside the tubing and work it up so that the bare section of wire was shielded inside the tubing. This prevents the exposed wire from touching metal.

Second, underneath the motor near the driver side tire there was a large-gauge black ground wire that had broken away from its eye connector. We stripped the end of the wire and attached it to a new eye connector. We unscrewed the old eye connector and screwed the new eye connector into the same spot.

Since we made those repairs on Sunday (after church of course) 12/11/11 the #10 fuse has NOT blown out again. I've driven the car four days now and haven't had to replace a fuse yet.

Again, I can't say which wire was the culprit, but I'd put my money on the ground wire.

[Chromehero]

This is an old question, but others might benefit from this.
Hate to say it but extreme aggravation calls for extreme solutions.
My brother and I have had this problem on cars and we COULD NOT find the electrical short. The only way we found one was using a bizarre method: We pulled the car into the garage at night, and had a good stash of spare fuses. After turning out the lights, we would keep putting the car into the situation which would cause the short to happen. In the dark, we would search for the sparks. Not the ideal solution, but it at least got us looking in the right direction. Once we narrowed it down to say, a two foot diameter area, then we would look for the problem in that area.
*****DO NOT use this method if there is ANY danger from gas (or any other flammable material, liquid, or vapor) in the area.

[jesselhodges]

I've been working on the same problem for 2 months now so I understand the confusion in finding the problem and finally believe its fully fixed. Mine would blow at random but did seem to lean more towards the times she would turn around with a hard left and then take off again and then may run fine for the next 2 or 3 the trips. It never blew while sitting still so was nearly impossible to find. The first place I looked was under the car next to the motor mount and frame as others stated. Its more to the passenger side of the car. The poor design did led to the movement of the car to slowing cut the wiring in half and cause it to short out or so I thought. I cleaned the frayed wires to the best of my ability, recoated with a wire silicone type stuff and wrapped with a thick plastic and used quick ties to keep the plastic in place. Then took a large quick tie and pull the wires away from the motor mount. This is quite a job as the wires hardly move here. After this I assumed it was fixed. A month passed and it didn't blow anymore fuses. Then last weekend we had new motor mounts put on and bam, the problem returned the first trip out. After reading a few more forums I started from the fuse itself and followed the wires till I found the new frayed wires. This time I found 4 or 5 bare wires under the air box. I included pictures to maybe help others. It wasn't to bad to get to, the only confusion came when I went to replug in the plugs I unhooked that was attached to the bad wires. It can plug in either way but couldn't figure out which way was right. I come to realize that the dirt and grime on the plug rested on the top of it and the cleaner side down which was when it was in the L shape. When you look at the plug that should make a little more sense. After that I put it all back together and so far so good. No blown fuses. Also when fixing this it also fixed the air which didn't has electricity to it so I got lucky and fixed it in the process.

[brownsfan71]

Transmission and motor mounts were worn out on mine. This caused the transmission to rub the five wires causing the short. The five wires were between the trans and PCM. Replaced mounts, repaired wires and relocated the wires above the PCM and ziptied in place. Issue solved.