need help: fogs and remote start

hi, I'm having somewhat of an electrical problem involving aftermarket fog lights and my remote starter. Here is what is happening. I installed the fogs first as an add on to my 2000 cavalier, then about 6 months later had a remote starter installed. One day I accidently left the fogs on after I went into work as the fogs were wired up to my battery diretly. Battery went dead as it drained. After that happend I decided to get my fogs at least hooked up through my ignition switch so that they will shut off when I shut the key off as a safe guard. I was happy! Then I had a remote start installed with keyless and alarm. That worked great. I am still happy. This is the problem... When I remote start the car there will be a crackling noise in the left front door speaker. This only occurs when the fogs were left on the night before. I need to find a fix for either the fog lights or the remote start. Fogs are 55w each, used a 15amp fuse. Fogs are wired through a relay, and have an on and off switch inside the car so I can turn them on and off if I wish. I know that the fogs are connected onto the LARGE ignition wire that comes off the switch, as is the remote start. I am suspecting that the extra draw the fog lights are creating is the problem here. Another thing worth mentioning is that this crackling noise I hear is something that develops over time. By over time I mean maybe 2 months of steady remote starts. What I found: There is a 30amp fuse that comes off the remote starter (2 of them, but only 1 is affected) and it attaches to the LARGE wire that the fog lights are connected to on the ignition switch. Now when this crackling begins to occur I noticed that this 30 amp fuse, fuse holder and part of the wire actually starts to burn. One time I found the fuse cover sitting on the floor as it melted itself off. I have continuously repaired this 30 amp line just for safety's sake, but I desperately need a solution... SO I decided to come here, to the only place that hopefully can help me..... Thanks for reading, sorry so long..... Ryan

Sounds like you might have a bad connection on that ignition wire. If a connection gets real loose it will cause the wires to arc and draw excessive current.(thats probably why stuff is melting) If it was my car I would disconnect the feed to the fog lights from the ignition wire and run power straight from your battery to feed the relay that runs your fogs. Make double sure that all of the remote start connections under the dash are tight. If you paid someone to install it I would take it back and ask them to check the high amperage connections. With out looking at it that is about all I can help you with. Good luck with the fix to the problem!Brian

owner/installer

Sight & Sound Car Stereo

"all electronic equipment runs off of smoke, once you let it out, it stops working"

Thanks for the response! All connections have been checked thoroughly no loose wires or no signs of any arcing. I was told that it's very possible that the current being drawn by the fog lights while the car is under the remote starter control is what the problem is. I was told that when the remote start is running the car, that the fogs are drawing too much current for the remote starter to handle, so in effect the extra current draw is actually going through my electrical system. I was advised to find another way to allow the fogs to disable with the key without using that ignition wire. How can this be done? Can anyone offer help? I don't want to resort to hooking the fogs back up to the battery as it has gotten me in trouble before....

The way I have always done this is to tap the parking light wire in the vehicle. Run this wire to a switch on the dash. From the switch on the dash run a wire to pin 85 on a relay. Ground pin 86. Pin 87 will go to your battery and pin 30 will go to your fog lights. That way the fog lights will only come on if your parking lights are on. You can still cut them off(if you want),and you wont leave them on because the chime in the car will remind you to turn them off. Try this out. It is how mine are hooked up and I have never had a problem. Good luck!Brian

owner/installer

Sight & Sound Car Stereo

"all electronic equipment runs off of smoke, once you let it out, it stops working"

Brianh, Thanks for replying, and i will try your suggestion, however i do have a few questions about this..... 1) if i tap into the park light switch, will the draw that the fogs produce cause the same problem that i am having how, except on another line. The remote starter is wired up to the parking lights while it runs... 2)If this does work, what can i expect to happen with the fog lights....how will they function differently then now? 3) is it safe to have all this current running through the parklight switch?

Ok, So be tapping onto the low beam headlights, to energize the relay should work ok? What about the current draw that the fogs will produce? Could I have problems with the headlight switch in the future, melting or burning due to the extra load? I don't think so, because i'm using a relay, but thought i'd ask to be sure... Thanks,

You not pulling power for your fogs from behind the fuse for the remote starter are you?

qveon, If you are referring to the original problem i posted (1st post) then no. the fogs are tapped onto the ignition wire that leads to the ignition switch. also tapped onto the same point is the wire that has the 30 amp fuse for the remote start. It's like 2 connections coming from the same wire. The fogs use a relay and the line that energizes the relay (turns it on and off) comes off this line that also has the remote start wire connected to it. IT's just like saying this: BIG IGNITION wire, has both the remote start 30 amp line which is burning and the fog relay energize line connected durectly to the BIG IGNITION wire. Nothing is tapped off the remote start wires. All connections are tapped from the OEM wires.

HELP. If i do what brianh suggested in his second post abot tapping into the parking lights, will i still have the same problem if i forget to turn off the fogs before running the remote starter? I think its the same hook up, just in a different spot. is it safe to tap onto the low beam light and run the fogs off that? Will the draw from the fogs place a draw on the wiring and burn the wiring over time? i'm going to try tapping off the low beam headlights while i await your answers. thanks...