Been rebuilding a 96 Disco 1 for my daughters first car. Engine rebuilt and all was running great but noticed I had no dash illumination or rear tail lights. I found that Fuse 2 in the engine compartment was blown and when I attempted to put a new one in it immediate sparked at me and blew. Been tracing wires, tracking wires, damn near memorized the RAVE wiring diagrams through this process as I am not electrically talented but know enough to be dangerous. In testing for a short with battery disconnected with connection on component side of F2 I get tone. I have gone through and unplugged everything I can think of or find in this truck and still get tone until I unplug the front right light connector at bulb. I have taken out F4 and F10 on the interior fuse panel to test from engine compartment F2 to interior fuse box and no tone/short. I switched out the light/turn signal switch to see if that was the issue and no change but in doing this I switched on the brights and the short goes away and I have rear lights. I get tone from Blue/Red wire when testing from plug at column switch. I get tone /short when testing from component side of F4 fascia fuse box and get tone on F10 both sides when testing. I continue to study the diagrams to see what else could be attached to this tree, relays that are switching that could be malfunctioning or causing the short. I do have a constant switching going on under the passenger side relay when regular headlights are switched on so have to spend some time on that search and tracking. I do have the console and dash currently removed so some access in this process. Otherwise, I have my head turning on this one and getting a bit frustrating and the answer is probably something simple that i am overlooking. Can't find any forum discussion on this specific issue so thought it was time to reach out. My daughter is/was looking forward to this being her first car since no one else around has one and it's a good first car, if I can get past this issue.

 

Take off the turn signal stalk and see what happens. They are notorious for going bad. I have not heard of one causing all your troubles, but it is a good place to start.

 

Walt, thanks for the thought and response. Yes, first thing I did and ended last night with checking each wire that runs to the plug in the back. I have the original stalk and a second hand one and neither change the issue with the short but I believe I continue to narrow down the issue. Very time consuming and have to keep thoughts in control to not get off task and bounce around too much.

 

You mention fuse 2 was blown - but I believe fuse 1 is what is supposed to control taillights/dash panel: https://fuse-box.info/land-rover/lan...989-1998-fuses

Not an expert, but I just ran into an issue with fuse 1 on my Disco 1, kept burning out when I activated the turn stalk to the right. I had ordered a replacement stalk, but resolved the issue between cleaning the rear turn signal bulbs and checking the wiring harness in the right rear.

 

check the bulb holders in the rear lights on the body and bumper. also check grounding points. Do you have a trailer socket on this truck?

this thread may help. https://landroverforums.com/forum/di...14/#post442858

 

Fuse 2 in the engine compartment fuse box is the one I keep blowing but I have ruled out a short from the engine compartment to the fascia fuse box and is downstream of fascia fuse F4 &/or F10 from testing and diagrams. I do have a new stalk coming (Switch) to rule that out as even after taking apart and cleaning contacts I still have the same symptoms. I only get a sign of the short when the light switch is in the off position and when turned on I get the same voltage from either side of engine compartment fuse 2 so obviously something is back feeding.

 

I do need to go through the rear light sockets and there was an aftermarket trailer wiring kit installed which I have removed. During short testing at the fuse box I can only stop the short when I unplug the front right side headlight or if I turn the lights on the short stops. Still working my way through the connections via the diagrams from RAVE and seem to be narrowing it down but damn this is time consuming and frustrating.