I do not know where you are, but I would be willing to take it after the insurance company pays you or just scrap it out to local metals recycler. There' a lot of AL there and that stuff has a good price per pound these days.

If I had it, I would gut all the wiring from the dash and just do a basic start from bare bones. Not something most people would want to do, but I did tons of wiring on a variety of defense vehicles from aircraft, missile, tanks, and other mobile platforms like rocket launchers with self contained radar rigs on top of turntables on a tracked vehicles that very few people have ever seen unless you have seen a captured Russian SA-8.

 

From Canada, my sincerest thx to you all.

My latest assessment: car is drivable and runs including all head lights BUT high beam remains the trigger for smoke so I am reluctant to drive unless I knew it is fully safe during daylight.....?

As suggested, I am exploring all options including insurance coverage (or upgrading it if it works). Luckily, an honest mate (Global British Inc.in Madoc, Ontario) can supply an entire dash harness & engine bay harness for the lighting for $395.

Perhaps, my most reasonable and trusted option.

Any further advise will be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

 

If you want to go down this path, you can unplug fuse 22 amd fuse 3 under the dash. They run the two head lights. Unplugging one may drop the load below the smoke point, dropping two removes all the main beam load. So there should be no smoke, and no high beams. Your problem is most likely in the switch, as the 10 amp fuses are between the switch and the bulbs. There is a 40 amp fuse link under the hood, ahead of the switch. So your smoke could be up to 40 amps of short before that would pop.

If trunks runs OK without the fuses, it will be the switch, or a rare short in wiring to head lights (easy to trace out with RAVE).

 

Muchas gracias.

 

Good Luck with it. Salvage it if you can, they do not make them anymore>

 

Self-repairing 99 LR disco....:-) I followed your advise and well! replaced another fuse (20 amps under the hood for sidelights). Interestingly, dash lights/sign were on (without the key in ignition & it also made beeping sounds). It all disappeared when I engegad and disengaged alarm. LR si running well & no issues after 10 minutes even with the lights on. Is this what was causing constant draining in the battery for several months? mmmmm! this is certainly an adrenaline rush (to have a fire extinguisher by my side but fundamentally) but is IT safe? After all, there was a short-lived mini fire down there????? Thoughts? Ideas? Advises? Comments? Thx

 

Smoke is generally the melting / burning of the insulation surrounding the wires. So if you inspect the calble harness near the terminals you may find spots where this happened. In the worst case vehicle fire. In the next to worse, insulation burns/melts off condutors and the bare wires short to something. So worth looking at even if not acting up anymore.

 

I would do a detailed visual inspection with good lighting. If it actaully flamed, there should be residual damage. I have seen various vehicles burn totally to the frame from fires, some may just be minor, but either one is bad and can strand you. I had to ****** off my shirt and beat out the flames while sitting in the driver's seat of my 67 Chevy Van with the 283 in between the front seats when it backfired thru the carb and caught on fire.

 

Did you contact Insurance Company?

 

He's out roasting the Disco now over hickory coals. Electrical damage can be hard to see, and lead to more problems. Once you have compromised the fuse system, the battery and alternator are quite capable of making a big problem. If it got hot enough to smoke insulation, the switch and relay contacts will be carbonized, and continue to overheat from the current passing through them.