98 Celica Electrics keep shorting?

Bonito

My brother in law has a 1998 beams celica, he's 2nd owner and has it just over a year now.

A couple months back he had a problem with his rear lights going if he pressed his breaks but his headlights would stay on. To stop this happening someone told him hold down the brake pedal and clutch pedal while starting,amazingly this worked and when he done does on starting it up he had no problems with the lights.

After a while he then had a problem with he car shorting out, the whole thing went because when it happened he had to reset his radio and clock.

The problem was found that 2 wires were crossing inside the dash behind the radio and it was running absolutely perfect after it was sorted but now it's starting to act up again.

This time the car will only short out when the headlights are on and he's braking. For example last week we were on the motorway and coming to the off ramp he touched his brakes and the headlights started to flicker, interior dials and clock light started to dim and he began losing power in the steering wheel.

When we exited the motorway we went into the garage, he pumped the brake pedal a few times and needless to say it eventually cut out and wouldn't start back up so he left it off and pumped the brakes while the engine was off and she eventually fired back up. When it was fired back up it didn't give any more problems after this but when it's left for the day while he's at work and then he goes to switch on the lights to drive home it'll start shorting when he presses his brakes.

The battery was checked and is fine, anyone ever had a similar problem?

cascade35

This used to happen on old fords (sierra,escort) from memory the tail lights would dim and flicker when the indicator was on, it was down to a bad earth on the rear light cluster.
Check that the earth strap from battery is secure

Bonito

bump

Bonito

Sorry for bumping agaian but hopefully i'll get some more info. and help now that more people are online

TestTransmission

Have you done what was recommended to you by Cascade?

Bonito

Yep we have, no problems when indicators are on and no problems with rear lights or earth strap from battery, problem only arises when brake pedal is pressed while lights are switched on

cascade35

It seems the last time ye had a problem it turned out to be dodgy wires behind the stereo, is it these same wires again? Is it possible that when they shorted out before they melted in another spot other than the one ye repaired.
Take out the stereo and try trace the wires back to the fuse box and check for damage.
Were they the actual stereo wires or part of a loom behind the stereo?
Was the stereo wired properly? ive seen guys take a live feed off any wire they can get it from to power a stereo and always at a later stage this will cause a problem.
Check the fuse box and see is there any melted fuses or any damaged wires behind it.

Bonito

Nope stereo is wired properly and wires aren't crossing anymore within the dash behind it, fuse box is fine too, cant trace wires too far down but from what we could there didnt seem to be any meltes or exposed or crossing each other

cascade35

This is getting tricky now, so hard to advise on wiring problems without been there with the car.
Ok try this add a new earth wire to the brake lights and see if it sorts it.
This may work if the problem is a bad earth on that circuit, but if its 2 live wires shorting together they will need to be found and fixed. Easier said than done.