Scooterpookin

Hey folks,

I got my 98 blue xj here and I love this thing. It took me from Florida to Arizona and I've had so much fun with this heap. Its been in storage for a while and pulled it out and it cranked right up. I wanted to get a new battery for it and down at the local Oriellys they wanted 250!! I wound up buying it but not before trying out my friends new Saab battery that has been sitting around. He said he would give it to me and so I was excited to be potentially saving $250!!

WELL In my Froogle excitement I made the most blatantly noob mistake I have ever made in my life!!! (welllll....) I think you know where I'm going with this....
I hooked up the battery... and yessss the Saab battery is a reverse polarity battery..... Positive to negative and negative to positive...

I noticed immediately and disconnected but two big sparks off the battery and I knew I had messed up. The battery terminal cables were pretty hot but I didn't smell anything burnt or see any smoke. I know that doesn't matter though..


Enough of my story, I hope it was entertaining Here is where I am at. With the Battery connected floorboard lights work. Get in turn the key to ON dash lights up but all my gages read zero. One odd thing is that my electric fan stays on the whole time. Turn the Key to start the jeep and the starter turns over great but the jeep wont start. Checked for fuel in the rail nothing so no gas. Could have fried the pump but it could be an electrical issue. Checked for spark and no spark could have fried something from distributor to wires etc., but could also be an electrical issue perhaps... (not sure). My headlights work but my power windows do not. There is clearly electrical issues happening but Im wondering if they all trace back to something consolidated ( at least that would be nice)

Here is what I've done so far : refreshed all the grounds that I could find body and engine. I've replaced all my relays and pulled a bunch of fuses but nothing looks blown. Junkyard I pulled ECU and the silver box on the driverside next to the gas pedal. All having no change to my symptoms. My current assumptions are that maybe I fried my whole fuse box if that even happens. Or that there is some wire in my harness that has fried.
My questions would be is there some sort of in line fuse or sensor that could cause all or some of these problems, Is it possible that I fried my entire fuse box, or is it that i fried a bunch of things all at once?

Anyways that's where I'm at. Like I said love this thing and I know my way around a junkyard. If i gotta pull the whole wire harness I will.

Any comments, suggestions, tips, tricks or laughs would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

djgrayxj

Note from DJ

I’m going to post a link to an old post for the same year and the same mistake as yours that I hope will help you in solving your problem.
https://www.cherokeeforum.com/f2/98-...-power-226626/

Scooterpookin

Hey thank you for posting that! And I found my fusable link, I checked for continuity it and was still good.

What if it's just my battery terminal cables? Could that cause some things to work and others to not?

This weekend I'm gonna probe the heck out of it

lawsoncl

Get a test light or a meter, and start checking if any fuses that should be powered with the key are are not. The ECU will turn on the fuel-pump for a few seconds at key-on, and then turn it off it it doesn't see the engine crank rotating. You have spark? Power to the injectors (on a 98, the ECU controls the ground side of the injectors)

Scooterpookin

I will check around for that thank you!!
I think I've been wrong about the year not sure if it's a 98 or 99 sticker on the door says it was manufactured on 9-98 but the vin shows an X which means 99 right I think the title also says 99 too.

Probably a 99 don't know if that changes things or not.