Topic

I'm trying to share some pics of my wiring that's gone up in smoke.
I'd like to hear what everybody thinks is the most probable cause and what it will take to get it sorted.
My car is in a garage at the moment and will get looked at in the morning, fingers crossed it won't all be too bad.

guessing the boot hinge has been rubbing it earthed it out.

Sorry mate.

Looks fixable but worth the rest of us having a check.

I've been told it's not uncommon for this part of the loom to go, I guess with all the movement going on its not too surprising that it would happen eventually.
But the cars not that old at 10 yr old and I've seen no sign of it happening.
It could explain why my alarm hadn't been working recently, could it be a fault on the alarm circuit, is there a switch in the boot?

It's that loom by the hinge. The bottom fixing(in your picture) causes the wires to flex too much. Eventually, you get broken wires and shorts.
You just need to replace the damaged wires. Leave extra length in the new wires and pull that bottom fixing off the hinge.

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My wiring was shorting out but thankfully didn't burn like yours, it is a problem. Its fixable just need you to solder in a new section ( I also gave is more slack to stop it chaffing again) then re-wrap the wiring to protect.

Is it a design flaw or something that is preventable. How common is the problem and is there anything you can check for or do you just have to wait for the smoke?

It is a very common fault for the wiring to go at that point. You have heat from the engine bay and wiring that moves to a large degree quite often. A little more slack in the loom helps, but you have the worst conditions possible for the wiring insulation.

It is a common problem on many cars, Vauxhall tried to get around it by fitting sprung contacts but they have their own problems.

Maybe the best solution would be to have a section of clear duct through which one would see any damage as it is develops.

Had the same problem with my ex 03 TF but no burnt wires just broken cores in the cable trunking. I have just finished rebuilding my 05 TF and while the engine was out (I took the boot lid off to make the job easier) to remove the boot lid you have to unthread the harness out of the boot which is a time consuming job on its own; so I fitted a new cable and extended it so there is a loop of cable above the boot hinge so the cables don't have to bend so much; I also put a male and female plug at the harness so if you ever need to remove the boot lid you just unplug the cable.

Just a note, in that part of the boot harness there are 2 cables joined together(a very poor factory job) one is an earth and the other is a permanent live feed (with the ignition off so disconnect the battery when you are doing the repair)

I used a good quality 7 multi-core cable (cable size 1mm sq per core) and a 9 pin connector as per the image.

The thing that is worrying to me is why the cables burnt; all the power feeds are fused and would be low rated fuses as you are only feeding the high level brake light and boot light, so check you have the correct fuses in the right place.

I was wondering why the fuse hadn't blown maybe it is to big ?
Mine have broken but not burnt