One of my accessory plugs has gone dead. The manual said to check a fuse, and it was bad, so I replaced it. Now all under hood fuses test good using an ohm meter. Still dead at the plug. There is one acc. plug mounted in the console below the radio, and one in the console storage area – the one under the radio is dead. All that plastic looks difficult to disassemble – I am wondering if anyone has a pro tip on how to troubleshoot such a thing. My guess is there is a fusible link along the harness to the upper console plug, but where, and what does it look like? Thanks in advance…
PS : I know the devices are good, they work in the lower socket.
Edited to note ONE socket is good, the other dead.
Are you sure the fuse hasn’t blown again? A blown fuse indicates a problem in the circuit. Unless you diagnose and repair the problem the fuse will keep blowing.
Yes I am. I replaced the fuse, saw it is still dead, and used the GPS and phone in another car to make sure they are ok. The plugs are still dead and I checked the fuse again, as well as all of the fuses. It did not blow again.
Still, come Friday afternoon, I will run through it all again as a triple check. EDIT : There are two sockets, one under the radio, and one in the console storage. ONLY ONE is dead – the one just below the radio.
For a fuse to blow, something must have shorted and I’m thinking before it blew a wire got damaged or something. You really need the schematic for the circuit, then you start at the fuse with a test light and go to each point beyond until you find you have no voltage, then you have found where the problem is. At least with both out, you know the problem is a common point for the two. I understand Autozone can provide schematics if you sign up with them if you don’t have a manual. Maybe there is a reset button or something or a second fuse.
Thank you for the tip – I signed up with a-zone and got the drawings. As it turns out, one socket (below the radio) is dead, but the one in the console storage is live. Sorry about that. The drawings show two fuses, but my car has only one installed (F1.17, 20A), and no metal contact for the second fuse (F1.15). The implication is one 20A fuse serves the two forward sockets. I think the 2nd fuse is for optional rear accessory power, which I don’t have. The dead socket under the radio has the shield ringing to round (good) but the two socket center pins don’t ring to each other, and the center pin of the upper socket doesn’t ring to the low side of the console fuse. There must be another fuse somewhere, at least it’s isolated to one socket now. I’ll look more this afternoon.
I had an accessory socket on my 2000 Ford Windstar that didn’t work from the time I bought the vehicle new. The socket was on the lower dash. One day while cleaning the van, I had the ashtray out and found a wire with a connector. I put two and two together and realized this was the connector for the socket–it had never been plugged in at the factory. I pushed on the connector and had a working socket.
FIXED – and I feel sheepish. There are two fuse boxes in this car – one under the hood, and one behind a panel under the dash. Each socket has a separate 20A fuse, one in each fuse panel. All is well! Thanks everyone for the kind encouragement.