Yikes! I stopped to fill a low tire Tuesday morning, leaving my car running due to the cold weather. After filling the tire I got back in my 1995 Impreza Wagon and as I was about to pull away i noticed a distinct smell, like burnt plastic and fire. Then I saw the white smoke around my hands and the steering wheel. Holy Crap! I parked immediately and turned the thing off! I jumped out and popped the hood just to see if any smoke was coming from underneath. Nothing. Got back in the car and could smell that very bad smell.

Luckily I'm no idiot. I called AAA for a tow and my Dad for advice.

 

Two days later and my car is sitting at the mechanics. He said he found a 'melted reistor' near the steering wheel area. He then refferred to this as an 'airbag resistor'.  I did my best to search this forum and some of the other forums on this site and couldn't find anything to match up. I have not been able to go see the car now that the mechanic has the dash open. I will tomorrow and take some photos.

My question is, does anyone know what this could be?

If there are other threads that might help feel free to point me to them.

Please show the pics. Usually it is the light controller that fries. i will wait for your pics so i can do a little research in the manual.

I will get some pictures tomorrow. I'm pretty interested to see exactly where the "melted resistor" was. I haven't done any replacement electrical work so I figure its just that time. Replaced jsut about everything else on her!

 

I appreciate your help and will post the pictures tomorrow afternoon.

There's no airbag resistor that I'm aware of, and I've studied these Subaru airbag systems pretty thoroughly.

 

There are some other things under there that like to smoke. The illumination module is the most common.

 

There is something under there that Subaru calls a Short Connector, but I haven't determined its exact location or function.

Pics will certainly help here.

I posted a photo of the resistor in my album. Not sure yet how to link it to this…but I'll get it. 

SO the above photo is of the faulty resistor. The mechanic said it was "taped to the wiring harness behind the instrument cluster". 

 

Hope this helps. I am waiting for some photos of exactly where this thing was. I may just have to go and take the photos myself : )

Looks like a Capacitor to me.

 

Could be to provide stable voltage to the dash or possibly the airbag unit???

 

IDK....that's a new one to me.

This just happened to me last Friday when my cluster grounded out against the dash bar in the rally car. I'll take a pic of where it's located in the harness. My SRS wiring is totally stripped so I know it's not air bag related.

 

It's a good thing the OP stopped and called AAA as the car goes into limp mode for 20 miles and then shuts off completely. 

Holy Crap! Thanks NorthCoast. I am certainly glad I wasn't in the middle of my morning commute going 70 MPH on the freeway. Wow.

I've got photos of where the mechanic said he took it from. 

So is it a Capacitor? And what exactly does it do or was it supposed to be doing? 

 

* More electrical info that may or may not be related:  Mid July my AC/heater switches (from low, medium, and medium high) stopped working. So it would only blow air on high. Didn't really have the money to get it checked out and wasn't going to worry about it until it stopped blowing completely. (The actual blower motor was replaced about 6 years ago with a new one.) 

About 4-6 weeks ago I came outside to the parking lot at work and could hear my radio playing. After working 12+ hours! Good battery thank god my car started. So I've been taking the face off my aftermarket stereo since then. 

Not sure if these changes were signs from the start that something had gone wrong (I actually saw a thread on the forum about how to fix the the AC/Heater switches issue. My Dad is sending me a heater relay : ) 

 

*if anyone that has gone through this capacitor issue or know what the photo above is, I appreciate your help. Sadly my Dad (he taught me all about Subarus and made me work on them as I was growing up) lives in WA and I'm on the other side of the US. My mechanic just doesn't understand our love and addiction to these awesome cars. 

Ok that photo above is from the mechanic. He said that is where the part in the first photo came from. Does that help? 

 

Mid July my AC/heater switches (from low, medium, and medium high)

stopped working. So it would only blow air on high. Didn't really have

the money to get it checked out and wasn't going to worry about it until

it stopped blowing completely. (The actual blower motor was replaced

about 6 years ago with a new one.) 

About 4-6 weeks ago I came outside to the parking lot at work and

could hear my radio playing. After working 12+ hours! Good battery thank

god my car started. So I've been taking the face off my aftermarket

stereo since then.

i'm not sure about the blower fan , but i think i remember it has to do with resisters in the fan it self,

but some one should know.

 

the radio is a likely cause of your current problem in my opinion.

after market radio installs oftwen cause problems,

like blown ''illumination modules''.

it seems yours just took some time to develop.

 

replacing the burnt unit without finding the cause could cause it to blow again, immediately.

 

you might consider adding ''comprehensive'' to your insurance policy if you DON'T find the cause.

if your car burns up you get paid.

Best I can figure is that could be the power window circuit breaker. But its hard to tell exactly where that connector in the photo is in the dash.

I've been looking over the FSM, and I come up with a circuit breaker for the power windows too. Its not the Air Bag system as that is pretty straight forward electrically.

 

You say an aftermarket stereo, how long after this was installed that things start going odd?

 

Blower motor is just the resistor block, a common thing to go bad and can be had at a junk yard. I can find a pic of it maybe if you want.

Still poking around and I think the power window breaker is mounted lower in the dash. Possibly on the lower cover under the steering column.

The mechanic said it was behind the instrument cluster. It appears the connector in the photo is up high next to the air tube for the dash vent (which would run behind the instrument cluster) or possibly just below the vent for the defrost.

So this burned up part must be something else.

 

Blower motor resistor block is on the passenger side behind the glove box. That will cause your high speed only blower fan operation. But that's NOT related to this problem.

 

The radio issue could be related somehow, but we still need to figure out exactly what the little burned up part is to figure out why it wasn't playing nice.

Can we get a pic not as zoomed in (to the harness)

Thank You everyone. I am always impressed by the knowledge shared here. 

 

First: I do not have power windows. My 1995 Impreza Wagon has NO extras. 

The aftermarket stereo was put in a couple years ago, by my Dad with my "assisting" as I am smaller and more limber (I had to do all the crouching and plugging while he pointed. So I wonder…Could this kind of problem really take that long to develop? 

 

The little burnt resistor/capacitor thing is basically under and to the right of my steering wheel I think. I have another photo that is less zoomed, I 'll post that. 

 

(I got the blower motor covered, my Dad is sending me that part. We are going to FaceTime and fix that together ; ) 

i will wait for the more zoomed out pic

 

 

This is a better shot (zoomed out) so you can see the location of the two prongs that were attached to the mystery piece. My dad thinks it could be an in-line fuse holder. 

 

The mechanic told me the car runs without it but I'm apprehensive to drive around like that. I feel like not fixing something will just bring more bad karma to my car and my wallet. 

Stopped by the Subaru Parts Counter and that guy didn't know what it was either. He thought it might be a fuse but couldn't pull up a diagram zoomed into that area. 

 

A few more photos, hope these help with the research.

Possible for the car to have the wiring for power windows even if it doesnt actually have power windows. Many times they make one main harness with most or all potential options already built into the harness, because its cheaper than making 5 or 10 different harnesses for different options.

 

Water damage or corrosion could have caused a short somewhere that would allow excessive current flow through that component and burn it out.

 

It could have been a diode of some sort. There are several of those wires into the harness in various areas. Diodes are used to keep voltage from back-feeding between connected circuits. But again, even if its a circuit for an option that's not on your car, something like water could have still caused current to flow in that part and cause it to burn out.

 

If it was a diode for an option that IS on the car, that circuit will no longer work, thus it should be fairly easy to narrow down what that part is, based on what doesn't work now.

Do you have access to the car to poke around some and figure out if anything isn't working, like lights, radio, Heater/vent controls? Any warning lights on in the dash?

Interesting point. 

I do have access but the entire front behind the steering wheel has been removed so no lights will pop up. I'll go back tomorrow and see what I can test, radio, lights, blinkers etc.