Dome light fuse blowing intermittently

[alia176]

I'm racking my brain with this particular puzzle of mine! My dome light fuse blows but w/o a pattern or predictability.

I've ruled out all of the light bulbs
Disconnected all four window and door lock panels
Ruled out map light bulbs
unplugged sun visor lights
unplugged all door courtesy lights

The fuse will be ok for a day or two and then POOF. I got one of those resettable 10amp fuse to help with troubleshooting. Sometimes it trips as soon as I insert it, other time it stays fine.

The factory alarm key fob doesn't work when the dome light fuse is blown as we all know. When the fuse doesn't blow, the key fob works the doors just fine. Locking/unlocking the doors doesn't cause this fuse to blow. I can still lock/unlock the doors with the key in the driver door lock. The fuse can blow on a drive or just sitting on the driveway over night.

This fuse also keeps memory on the mpg display, clock and the trip odometer.

I've been studying the EWD and trying to figure out what turns on/off intermittently in my vehicle that might be causing the dome light fuse to blow.

Obviously I have a short to ground and quite possibly there's a floating power wire that came out of it's connector but where it might be is the challenge!

If you got any ideas, I'm all ears!!

Thanks.

PS: This thread solved the riddle by removing both visors which cured his issue. I'll do the same thing tomorrow and see what happens. I disconnected the visor light connectors and that didn't solve it so I'll try this solution.

https://www.toyota-4runner.org/3447474-post12.html

 

[alia176]

Time for an update. After couple of weeks of the dome light fuse not blowing, she blew last weekend :-( I can't seem to find a pattern. Right after I replaced the fuse, it blew again. This time, three of the doors were open, including the rear hatch. We were camping in CO.

I pulled the light bulb on the visors and thought maybe that was it but nope. I've pulled every single bulb in the dome light circuit but that didn't help either. I'll convert them all to LED warm white just because I want to lower the electrical load while we're camping and the doors are open.

Back to reading the EWD again.

 

[riceandpho]

you might want to check the tabs on the dome light, see if they are touching the body, just bend and pull it down, be careful not to snap it. also if your using those spring loaded double end replacement with the wire pig tail, it maybe shorting out on the wire, i take those apart and solder the wire and hot glue them, no more spring loaded.

Time for an update. After couple of weeks of the dome light fuse not blowing, she blew last weekend :-( I can't seem to find a pattern. Right after I replaced the fuse, it blew again. This time, three of the doors were open, including the rear hatch. We were camping in CO.

I pulled the light bulb on the visors and thought maybe that was it but nope. I've pulled every single bulb in the dome light circuit but that didn't help either. I'll convert them all to LED warm white just because I want to lower the electrical load while we're camping and the doors are open.

Back to reading the EWD again.

 

[Kagab]

I have a very similar issue with the dome fuze. Yesterday I was led swapping the interior lights to LED and when I went to put in the dome light, I blew the fuze. Which is weird because these are the same LEDS I used to LED swap my last 4runner (which was a v6 and my current one is a v8 if somehow makes a difference). I used different kind of LEDS and I kept blowing the fuze. As of right know the only LEDS it can handle are the door lights and the map lights. If I try to add LEDS to the visor lights or dome lights, the fuze blows. I really wish I had a answer to it but I just wanted to put this out there so you know you aren't the only one with a dome fuze issue.

 

[riceandpho]

what leds are you guys using?

if it got a heatsink on the back, you guys might not know there is contact made with the sides for the power and ground.

suggest you guys to really take the time to inspect those ends at the socket, it might be grounded out since the tabs is flimsy.

 

[alia176]

I wanted to circle back and close out this thread. I FINALLY discovered why my dome light fuse keeps blowing and you'll be impressed with the cause.

A while back I replaced both visors with OEM units and it was the passenger visor vanity light that was the cause.

No, it wasn't the bulb. :Cry:

It was the factory wiring INSIDE the visor that was causing a short and blowing the dome light fuse.

I used a resettable fuse to systematically trace out the dome light circuit and this is what I used amazon link. I don't suggest you drive with these fuses but they're great for troubleshooting purposes. One downside to these fuses is that they're a tad too short to sit in the fuse location so I had to extend the legs.

Anyway, here's the pic of me cutting the POS(+) leg of the vanity wire circuit.

One good thing about this process is that I really learned the EWD and how to use it as a resource. I also may have found a discrepancy in one of the circuit. I have the EWD book so it's in color and I drew on it like a toddler

I hope this helps out others.