the strangest thing....

[saturnine_sweet]

Ok...yesterday, I replaced the shift cable on my 96 firebird 3800 auto. No problem, right? Drove it a bit, made sure all was well, seemed great. Took it out last night...and I start having some odd feeling in how its running, and then I get a check engine light. Well, since Ive been fixing this car up from being well...a horrible mess, basically...I have kept a code reader hooked into the OBD plug everytime I go out after doing a repair. So I look down at the reader...and its blank. Well, thats strange. So I unplugged it....and my voltage went WAY down in to the orange, engine starts missing, etc....I plug it back in, still doesnt work, but the electrical things go back up.
Parked it last night, too tired to mess with it. Today, went out and checked the few connectors I messed with while changing the shift cable. All look good. Pulled all non-essential fuses...still happens. The only other thing Ive noticed is that there is an odd clicking coming from the passenger side dash, with the key in but the car not started. Very slow, but regular, every 5-10 seconds. Does anyone have any idea? Ive never seen anything of the sort...

[nascar24jd]

Re: the strangest thing....

I don't think you are supposed to unplug and plug in the scanner with the car running.

Disconnect the scanner. Then disconnect your battery for a little while. Let the computer reset itself.

Then reconnect the battery and go for a ride, without the scanner.

See if the SES light comes back on.

[saturnine_sweet]

Re: the strangest thing....

tried that. Issue isnt so much the SES light as the fact that unplugging the reader (even with the key turned to accessory) makes the voltage drop dramatically.

[saturnine_sweet]

Re: the strangest thing....

(to clarify, unplugging it with the key off makes it drop too, to the point that the car has difficulty starting)

[blindeyed]

Re: the strangest thing....

The clicking you're talking about and the location you say it's coming from makes me think it could be the BCM (Body Control Module). It essentially controls all the electronics inside the car. Try removing the passenger kick panel, there's a few screws along the side of it, and then it just pops out. From there you should see a black box with a bundle of wires going to it. See if you can pin point whether or not if it's what's making the clicking noise.

[saturnine_sweet]

Re: the strangest thing....

an update...the clicking mentioned above is gone...everything seems great, in terms of electrical issues...unless I unplug the OBD code reader. Still a significant voltage drop when that is unplugged. Drops even if I pull the fuse for the cig lighter, which I think is the proper one for the OBD reader. Any more ideas?