Replaced battery, car still won't start - Possibly fried the electronics

23063 Views 26 Replies 11 Participants Last post by 0dyfamily, Jun 24, 2010

aspencer80

Discussion Starter · Feb 5, 2010

I'm affraid I may have screwed the pooch this time. Let me know what you think...

Wife called from home today that our 04 Odyssey EX wouldn't start. Within the last 6 months or so our kids have managed to drain the battery twice by leaving on some interior light. Because of this I bought a Batttery Tender to help charge the battery back to full capacity after jumping the battery. Just 3 weeks ago I used the Battery Tender to top off the battery.

When I got home I hooked up the Battery Tender, but it showed a constant red flashing light, normally indicating a bad battery connection or (after I looked it up) a battery below 3 volts that might not recharge.

To make a long story short, I wanted to hook up my battery from our '97 Acura 3.2 TL on the van to at least start it and turn off whatever interior light was on that drained the battery.

In the process of connecting the Acura battery I hooked up the wrong battery terminals! As soon as I connected them the car horn sounded. In a single car garage this scared the heck out of me and my ears are still ringing. I assumed the horn sounded because of the car alarm. So I tried several more times to turn off the 'alarm' by hooking up the battery and then trying the remote key fob, the keys in the door, and the keys in the ignition. Each time I would connect then disconnect the battery terminals.

Now it seems as though the horn sounding was an indicator that the battery was hooked up in reverse. It wasn't until later that I figured out my blunder. (The acura battery had each terminal on the opposite side, and there was some red anti-corrosive stuff surrounding the negative terminal which made me think it was the positive. Plus it was dark in the garage. Argg!!!)

Now for the bad news. I replaced the van battery with a new one, go to start the car and still nothing. Ughh....
Oddly enough the emergency flasher lights and the brake lights work when I tell them to, but nothing else as far as I can tell.

I checked the fuses near the driver's side left leg. Those all seemed fine.

I'm stuck now. Don't know what to do. I'm affraid I fried some electrical componenet by repeatedly hooking up the Acura battery in reverse.

Anything else I could check before handing it over to the shop along with all of my credit cards?

I'm also literally stuck... in the garage. We have a single car garage and I don't know how to push the car out if I need to get it towed. Is there some way to take the car out of Park without starting the car? I tried by turning the key all the way in the ignition, placing my foot on the brake, but it won't come out of park.

I really appreciate any help.

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aspencer80

Discussion Starter · #6 · Feb 9, 2010

Main fuse blown

Yup. The main battery 'butterfly' fuse under the hood was blown.
It was a 150 amp fuse.

No parts store in the area carries that fuse, so I went to Honda service center with the fuse in hand to show it to them. They don't carry it on hand so they had to special order it.

When it came in today to pick it up it was a 120 amp fuse. I told the guy the fuse I pulled from the car was 150 amp and he said they don't have 150 amp fuses. There wasn't even one listed in the computer system.

So I left with the 120 fuse. I figure I'll pop it in and hope I don't blow it (and I'll make sure to not hook up the battery wrong.)

My van is an EX with the DVD package... I hope this won't blow the fuse.

Should I have anything to worry about? Should I refuse to use the fuse? (what a mouth full) I have no other option because no one else around here carries a 150.

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aspencer80

Discussion Starter · #11 · Feb 10, 2010

So good news and bad news.
Stuck in the 120 fuse and the car finally runs again. Phew!!

Bad news. The radio and DVD player no longer work at all. Not even a security code request on the radio.

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aspencer80

Discussion Starter · #14 · Mar 7, 2010

So yeah, all the fuses look OK.
But no radio...

Not even the alarm light on the radio blinks when the car is locked.

I guess its fried.

I'm guessing the only thing left to do is replace the radio. Anyone know of any places to scope out prices? I have the DVD package as well.... so who knows how much this is going to cost.

Maybe I'll replace the head unit first, see if the DVD player works. If not, replace the DVD player/screen next.

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aspencer80

Discussion Starter · #18 · May 6, 2010 (Edited)

More help needed.

So I rechecked all the fuses. All OK
Pulled out the radio. Dismantled it, everything looked Ok (not that that means anything)
I checked the voltage coming from the plugs that go into the back of the radio. I didn't know where to stick my mulimeter probes so I tried several contacts and was able to get 14v readings from the main plug (or what looked like the main plug)

I bought an identical radio from a auto recycler. I installed that radio today and..... nothing. It still shows no signs of life.

So what else is there to check between the battery, fuses, and the radio?

Thanks for any ideas.

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aspencer80

Discussion Starter · #22 · Jun 12, 2010

Partial Solution

So I took the car in to a radio installation shop to see if they could find the problem. They tested all the wires from the battery to the radio. Turns out one of the power wires from the passenger side fuse box shorted between the fuse box and the radio. They ran their own wire and hooked it to the fuse box and the radio and viola, the radio works.
I paid $275 for them to find and fix it.

This is only a partial solution as the DVD player still does not work. The radios displays ERROR when trying to turn the DVD player on. So Im trying to find out how to take the DVD player out and test it or replace it. It seems harder to remove than the radio.

But at least we have music!! Yippee!!!

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aspencer80

Discussion Starter · #24 · Jun 23, 2010

Skindog said:
There are radio/DVD fusible links that I blew when the auto parts store gave me the wrong battery and when I connected it, (horn blew, lights flashed, etc.) it blew the 20A fusible link for the radio/DVD that's mounted near the battery, labled RR ENT SYS.

Skindog, you ARE THE BEST!!!!!
That was it! I never knew there was a little fuse box there right by the battery. It isn't labeled as anything so I didn't think twice about it. None of the schematics I looked at were for a car with the rear entertainment system I guess cause they never mentioned it.
It was the 20amp fuse. I bought a $4 replacement and VIOLA it works! (Can you tell I'm excited?)

And on Friday we're leaving on a 18 hour car ride down to New Orleans. Those 18 hours are going to pass by a whole lot smoother now. Pheww!!

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