wires from inner fender to strut???

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Our pt cruiser has on each side a wire that goes from the inner fender area to the strut. It has this on both sides and both sides were broke. But what are they really for? I see absolutely no purpose at all.
 
Originally Posted By: racer12306
I believe its for grounding. Many of those are broke with no ill effect.


That's what I thought. But what in the world is it grounding. Lol
 
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Originally Posted By: ram_man
Originally Posted By: racer12306
I believe its for grounding. Many of those are broke with no ill effect.


That's what I thought. But what in the world is it grounding. Lol


I'm sure you realize that chassis grounding is merely a zero point reference.

That said, there is some electrical discharge via the (conductive due to carbon black in the rubber) tires. If there was not, a car's "ground" referncce voltage could creep up, and the car could build up a charge. I would imagine that these conductors are routing that way. I've done wheel bearings where there is a piece of material inside the grease cap to facilitate movement of charge.
 
Have those ground wires on my neon; one was seemingly cut with dikes before my ownership. Thanks for pointing out they need attention and repair.
 
Have those ground wires on my neon; one was seemingly cut with dikes before my ownership. Thanks for pointing out they need attention and repair.
 
Miscellaneous rambling:

FoMoCo paid for a lot of classes to earn/keep our certs up to date. In one electrical class we were looking at PCMs and discussing the way they are built and the electrical protections (diodes/zeners/MOVs/caps)designed into them to combat stupidity. People install batteries incorrectly/backwards, sometimes they jump a car with the ground clamp on the fuel rail. Anyways we got off on a tangent in one of our discussions and grounding, EMF and RF interference etc.

Car bodies/chassis all have different potentials when on the road. Most of your electrical charge is from road contact. Airflow over the car is also a big cause of differing potentials. Some cars have little spring metal "pads" that contact the hood when it is closed, or they have straps. Hatchbacks sometimes have ground straps. Exhaust pipes have ground straps. Bushings are potential insulators making subframes, axles, engine/trans mounts, body mounts all contributors to buildup of electrical charges. Figure in composite, and or plastic components, and you have another problem to contend with. We were told to picture a car body with thousands of electrical arcs occurring every hour it was driven.

Engineers drive prototypes and they measure the potentials all over the vehicle and take action when required. Without proper grounding you can have constant electrical arcing which causes voltage spikes (KV level high voltage short duration spikes specifically) between components. Besides the damage the spike itself can cause, each spike creates RF which have the potential to interfere with electrical signals. Suspension bushings, mounts and other rubber components are all designed to conduct electricity (to a certain extent) and cut down on KV level potentials.) Eventhough rubber components on vehicles have carbon black in them, they can still be pretty good electrical insulators.

Respect for engineers and all the potential problems they have to find solutions for.
 
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