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gauges fuse blowing, battery not charging
My wife has a 98 corolla with 100k miles on it. She got it from her father and he said “never touch the cruise control or is blows a fuse”. Recently the the car would not start, just clicking when we turned the ignition. Being the tell-tale sign of a bad battery, I replaced the 6 year old battery. After which, the car ran fine except the speedometer, temp gauges and ventilation fan were no longer working. I talked with her father and he said those are the symptoms he was talking about that he thought were related to the cruise control being “touched”, of which he had not touched. He directed me to a fuse and it was indeed blow...I identified it as the gauges fuse. Upon replace it, the aforementioned gauges worked for a short period(like a day) and then stopped. After a couple more days, the car would not start, familiar clicking noise of the starter solenoid. Clearly the batter was not getting charged. I replaced the alternator and the car started and ran fine, but dies when I remove the battery negative cable...clearly the batter was still not charging. I replaced the gauges fuse again and tested the charing systems by removing the negative lead and the car kept running. OK, good, right. We drove the car 5 miles, parked and then, on our way home, the gauges went out. We drove straight to a repair garage. Sure enough the gauges fuse had blown again. The mechanics shop tested the system and said my brand new alternator had blown diodes. I got a new new alternator from the parts shop under warranty however, the mechanic agreed that it did not jive with the overall description of the problem. They traced wire continuity through the whole charging circuit except the junction panel with the integration relay. They said all checked out ok and they concluded it was the integration relay. They then said that they could not get the part and that I needed to take it to the dealer. They replaced the gauges fuse again and took it for a test drive(with the new new alternator) and the fuse was OK afterwards so they sent me on my way. Before I got home(maybe one mile down the road), the gauges died and when I got home I checked the gauges fuse and it was blown. I have searched the forum for ideas and studied the wiring diagrams. I see that the gauges fuse is in line in the charging circuit. I have removed the panel around the junction box I believe houses the integration relay(lower panel on wall of driver side foot well) but have not identified the integration relay itself. I check the cruise control switch on the steering column and it had been disconnected, so that was not it.
Does the mechanic diagnosis of a bad integration relay sound correct? Does anyone have experience with a similar problem on a Corolla and may be able to point me to common problems. I am worried about intermittent wiring ground faults. I am worried that the actual problem is eating alternators. I am worried about spending too much money on this car(that already uses oil). I am some what experienced at auto repair, but not this car and am used to having all my tools and a garage to work on it in. At the moment, I am going to school in New York City and all I have is a limited set of tools and a parking space. But, I figure I can fix this thing. Any help would be much appreciated.
Randy
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