legacycentral bbs

Hello everybody, i am new here to the forums but not new to subarus. i have recently purchased a project car (93 Legacy SS) and i will quickly give an overview of the car.
I bought the car in a non running state, it was sitting out for at least 5 years without being started or any of that sort. so i know that i have alot of work cut out for me. but the first and most puzzling problem is the electrical work (or so i think) it was wired with a Viper alarm system and the previous owner was having problems before putting i away to sit for 5 years, it kept draining the battery of the previous owner and she finally stopped using it. until i purchased it.
so here is what i have done, i started by removing the viper alarm system (which was professionally wired so i don't feel that it was screwed up) and re-attached the wires and bought a new battery, and this is what happens, i open the door and it has lights that show up showing that the doors are open and the over head lights work and when i put the key in it has the buzzing noise if the door is open and when i turn the key, to the On position, nothing happens, you cannot hear the fuel pump, the radio doesn't turn on, the windows don't work, (although the brake light works) non of the lights on the dash show up like the battery or check engine light etc.

i then decided to switch out the steering column with a different legacy ss to see if this might work but still nothing, i now am pulling out the dash and replacing the entire dash wiring harness. but i have no where to go after that. or if i am even going in the right direction. could anybody please help me out it would be greatly appreciated. i just want to get the running and it will be smooth sailing from there (i know alot about the boxer engines just not the electrical work)

Thanks very much!

Welcome to the BBS.

I would highly suggest you look at the fuse boxes and check all the fuses before going any further. There may be a fusible circuit that is bad or blown, a slow blow fuse ,or a regular fuse.

You mentioned you removed the Viper alarm. Where and how was it wired into the car and what did you reconnect/rewire to remove it?

thanks very much for the welcome, and to answer your question, i checked every fuse in both boxes and none of them were blown. and to answer your question with the alarm system, it was a Viper 400 Security system with a remote start from what i can tell. so there was a red wire that was cut that attaches to the ignition key within the column and the black plug was unhooked. so i removed the splice and attached the two cut connections back together and i also plugged back in the black plug. the rest of the wires were just spliced into with a little connector plug which just snaps off and you don't need to re attach the wires. so i am positive i didn't screw up anything. any ideas?

Did the black plug look like this?

http://www.surrealmirage.com/subaru/ima ... rness1.jpg

I made a harness when I did my AWD & 5MT swap and I found that for whatever reason the black plugs I cut out of my donor car were causing me issues and not letting the car to start. I think there may have been some bad wiring. If you disconnect the black plug, you can put a set of jumper wires on specific pins and get one of those push button starter switches to try "hot wiring" things to see if you have a problem in the ignition switch area or possibly in the wiring.

The links in this area of my swap write-up has wiring diagrams so you know which pins on the black connector do what and which one to connect to the switch.

http://www.surrealmirage.com/subaru/swa ... html#start

Unfortunately, I think you're just going to have to do some more troubleshooting to try and narrow down the problem.

Thanks very much for the help, to answer your question, yes, that is the black cord that i am talking about. but before i go and try to do that harness. i checked the power that was coming to the ignition switch, and all other wires that go to the steering column, with a probe (the one that you ground and then stick into the plugs to see if there is power getting to it) and i am not sure but some plugs had some power getting to it through one wire, but with alot of the connectors that i checked, there was no power getting to it. my question is, which wires and which plugs should be receiving power? i can post pics or video if you don't understand what i am talking about.

This is the diagram you need.

http://www.surrealmirage.com/subaru/fil ... uting2.jpg

The highlighted yellow connector, B63 is that black connector. Only one pin will have power going to it. All the other pins will be feeding power to other things, like the fuse box, or the starter when the ignition switch engages it.

This is the connector you would setup with jumpers and a starter push button to see if your problem is the ignition switch.

Pins 1, 2, & 5 would need to be connected, and then a high amp starter switch/button would need to be used between pins 1 & 4. You'd then press the button or switch to crank the motor like you would with the ignition key.

oh ok, thanks so much for your help. i understand it now. i will go and check that out tonight when i get home, i am having my friend look at it with me so i will be able to hopefully get this fixed by tonight. thanks guys!