Vette.SSS.SHO2

Thanks for the info! So you don't think i need to add this fuse under the hood? I can't seem to find a definitive answer to that one. much appreciated! I do need one, unfortunately I need to either get this done this weekend or do without the trailer brakes. it should be ok like that, but I'd feel better if I had the extra braking power.

I need some help. I've searched and found some information, some of it conflicting. I understand that putting a brake controller in the SSS is very simple, basically you just get the controller and the right adapter to the 6 pin brown connector and just plug it in. is is really that easy? some of the threads on this topic refer to the place where you plug that in as the BCM, but i'm pretty sure its just the electrical center to the left of the brake under the dash right? the label under the cover says brown 6 way trailer or something like that on the correct connection. according to my shop manual (unless I'm reading it wrong) that is not the BCM, the BCM is the computer directly below the steering column, the knee panel must be removed to see it, the place where a brake controller is just an electrical center of some kind right? I saw some references to needing a fuse to be installed in the fuse panel. on my fuse diagram the one that's circled in the threads here says something like Stud 1, is that the correct location? mine has a red plastic thing on it that says B+. the fuse diagram doesn't say what fuse rating I should use, 40A? also i thought that i checked that terminal once when i was looking for a good place to get B+...and found no power there at all. is that actually a switched power source or something? some sites (not SSS.com) refer to needing to take the fuse panel lower shoud off and finding a red wire with a ring terminal and attaching it to an available stud...but all the SSS threads say nothing of this, just add the fuse, who is right? thanks!

I'm not entirely certain. its quite possible. so far its still ok, it only happened that one time. I sure hope its not the actuator, I always thought that was the typical culprit when its one side and not the other. I had the whole dash out of my Corvette twice to correct the problem when its passenger's side actuator went bad. I was on a trip with a friend when it happened, he was freezing the entire time but beling polite he never told me, I was toasty and warm, i had no idea his side was dumping 20*F air on him. only good news was the it was the blend door wharpage problem, so it was a multi-hour but ultimately free fix. I just needed to do the reposition the position feedback pot gear trick and its been working flawlessly for the last 2 years.

Thanks for the help. 6awg 2 harnesses of 18, 1 16 and a usb cable..all fit nicely through the large firewall gromet.

was driving the other day with the climate control on manual mode set at the highest temp (32C) it was cold out and I like the warm air blowing from all vents. once the truck was warm it got too hot so I turned it down, but by contrast the air felt too cold, started turning the temp back up one degree at a time, but it stayed cold even when I got it back to 32. passenger's side was fine. My vette did the same thing to me, it was a major pita. this time though, after a restart of the truck the heat was back and its been fine ever since. was this just a fluke or something i should be concerned about? this truck probably uses the same cheap actuator assemblies the C5 does, I really don't want to have to rip into the dash to replace it. on C5's by 2003 they had redesigend the control unit so the stupid things don't mistakenly think they are out of range and default to fully open dumping freezing outside air in. I would have thought the truck would have the necessary fixes already implemented. just in case I do need to replace or disassemble the actuator and index the gear, is there a write up on how to get to it?

thanks for the help! I've got 1 6awg and about 20x 18-16awg wires that need to go through. I might use a combination of making my own hole vs using the factory one. what's the best safe place to drill to put in my own gromet? any pictures? I have some liquid tight cord grips I'll probably use.

tried a search but couldn't find what I'm looking for. I'm sure its here somewhere... looking for the best methods of passing wires through the firewall. I sent somethrough the gromet where the throttle wiring harness goes, but that was before i knew which harness that was. for some reason I don't like that idea. something about EMF in the vacinity of the throttle wires makes me nervous, or am I just being way too careful? the big gromet where the factory wires go through. looks simple enough, I tried to pass a line through there to fish wires through, i couldn't get it to go through. i think i saw a picture somewhere of others who cut their owh passage way through that gromet since it looks like ther's more than enough room to cut a new hole in the rubber safely away from factory wires. what's the best way? pics would be great. thanks!

The install wasn't too bad. I didn't know that the SS had fog light wiring in place when i did this or I probably would have tried to use it. but instead I just ran my own wires. the fog lights are the Blazer International ones, they are the stock fog lights from my Corvette, although I bought a new set after I made sure they would work since the vette's were in bad shape after many highway miles. the replacements I bought from TRS, they might be the same ones the TBSS uses also, I'm not sure. they seem to be found on lots of GM vehicles. but the way these particular projectors narrow towards the rear made them a perfect fit on the SS. the fogs that I have now on the Vette are hella micro DE's, that was my first plan but they never would have fit. if you remove the lower grill you'll see parts of the metal bumper occupying much of the same space where the fog lights were, I cut off the back half of the fog light mounting brackets and rotated them so they'd mount to a vertical surface, then they mount to the front of that member. the lights fit so perfectly in front/below the metal bumper i couldn't have planned it better myself. to finish off the installation I used some bezels from TRS. cut the holes in the lower grill, painted the bezels flat black and installed them around the lights so they would cover the cuts to the plastic mesh material. looks really nice. inside are 35W 6000k hids, these projectors have a very nice cutoff to them. I still have a little bit of adjusting to do to aim them perfectly. I'm thinking about making some new brackets which offer more precise alignment features.

thanks

started my truck and didn't hold the key in start quite long enough. to my surprise it seemed that he engine kept cranking even when I let go and successfully started the engine. I know some cars do have this kind of feature, turning the key to start doesn't actually engage the starter, it just instructs the car to activate an automatic startup process. I know you have to hold the key to start for a second or so before this happens on the SS. but the owners manual doesn't seem to confirm that such a mechanism is part of the SS. does anyone know for sure?

I asked a similar question a while back, I have a more specific request now, does anyone know where is the best place to tap into an ignition wire which is on in run and start preferably, or acc, run, and start as a backup. I'm looking for an ignition signal which doesn't turn off while the engine is cranking.

Looking for the best/easiest way to turn on the SS's reverse lights. I see the LT GRN wire that actually powers them (in schematics) I'm not sure where the best place is to tap into this wire. also the BCM has control of these lights doesn't it? so that it can turn them on with the factory approach lights? does the BCM actually switch power directly to the 20A fused circuit? or is there a relay somewhere on the backup lights? the relay would be my preferred method of turning them on, especially since I wouldn't have to worry about the unknown current draw possible through the trailer connector.

Thanks! I'll try the easy fix first. But for the cost I think $100 is worth it to just be done with the problem for good.

I'm a fairly new owner, only had it for a couple months. I knew about the steering clunk problem and looked for it during the test drive. Perfectly fine. Well I just started to notice something in the steering. I Woudln't describe it as a clunk, but maybe that's coming. The word I'd use is pop. I can hear a noise, and feel a "pop" sensation in the steering wheel. Is this the common steering clunk problem? What is the best solution for this now? I have found many threads on the topic some with various different answers to how this can be fixed ranging from expensive trips to the dealer to nearly free installations of a grease fitting and filling the steering shaft with grease. Some of the threads are very old, SO I don't know if newer methods have been found that are more effective. I've only been observing the probelm for about 2-3 days now, it just started like that and seems to be getting progresively worse, and very very fast at that. Beginning of this week the steering was silent and solid. Now it pops about a dozen times from lock to lock pretty consistently.

Welcome! Great combination of rides you have there.

Yep, that's the way. Easy to do. Unfortunately you lose your approach lights and illuminated exit by doing that. So I'm working on a better way that will let me ditch what I don't want and keep the features I like.

Thanks for the welcomes!

THa's a great how to guide on the LEDs. Looks like I'm in for more fun. I'm pretty familiar with the process of replacing GMs light bulbs with LEDs. Do you seem to have good luck with the 470ohm resistors? I guess it depends on the products. In y Corvette I used 5mm LEDs and the resistor that was recomended to pair with them for 12V operation by the company where I bought them. I started killing them a couple a month. Very frusterating to pull the CC module out over and over again replacing a couple of flickering LEDs at a time. I thought at first they might have just been poor quality LEDs but I had never questioned the specs before, so I did the simple math on the circuit, the company was specing the wrong Resistor based on the forward current on the LEDs. Like most they were suggesting 470 ohm, but the math worked out almost perfectly for 560 ohms. I started replacing them with 560 as they went out, no more problems. Pulling the climate control is one thing, I only want to have to take the cluster apart once :-) So on the cluster, I can (Very) gently rotate the needles CCW until they reach their stops, then mark that exact position with a sharpie on some painter's tape, then when reassembling them just make sure when I gently rotate to the stop CCW they match up? The how to talked about getting teh truck up to temp to set the position, if I just use the stops on the servo motors that would be easier. I can verify some of the readings with ODB2, but not all of them are reported electronically.

Great! Thanks for the welcome! I have a few pictures floating aroundI'll have to find some and post a couple. Thanks for the info on the ignition fuse and the aux in. I'm not used to not having the shop manuals to use for reference. They're out of stock until sometime next month from what I understand. So I'm flying blind trying to figure out how to hook a few things up. I Will never understand why GM chooses to solder light bulbs right onto circuit boards making them so hard to replace. I guess they figure it will be out of warranty before the first one goes, and if so its someone else's problem. Sucks fo rthe owners though! Nothing I haven't been through before, but I do not like the idea of having to pull the gauge needls off. I've done that on antoher car once and don't want to do it again. Do the motors have stops in them? That would at least make it a little easier to get them back on in the right spot. I assume they aren't keyed, most aren't. Oh, andotehr problem. Seat heater controls backlight is out on the passenger's side, any trick to replacing that? Is that a removable bulb or anotehr solder job? I guess I need to get ready for another inteior LED conversion... Although I always like the results!

Just wanted to say hi. I bought a 2003 SS a few weeks ago, Arrival Blue. So far I'm enjoying it very much! Its my first truck. I've needed one for a while. I'm into sports cars so of course I wanted a sport truck. Since one of the tasks I have for it is winter duty it had to be 4 wheel drive or all wheel drive, which eliminated everything from teh running but the silverado SS. So far I've worked to customize it a little to my liking. I'm working to remove the nannies. Pulled the onstar fuse, where is th ebox located? I want to take it out entirely. Deleted the DRLs then rewired them to come on with the parking lights, because I like the look, I just don't like lights coming on all by themselves. Deleted the auto lights, although I'm working on a better way to delete them with the option to make them still work when I want them, and making the approach lights still work. I added HID projector fog lights, TBSS style, not in the "brake" ducts. I put most of my car energy into my otehr vehicles, but I'll be having some fun with this since its the new toy! Is there a way to remove the seatbelt warning light? I'm a religious user of seatbelts, but I don't like my car telling me to put it on. Some cars have the seat belt tied into the air bag system, I don't want to compromise safety systems. If that's teh case can I remove teh bulb without adverse effects? Speaking of bulbs, I think I have one out in my instrument cluster. Please tell me GM didn't solder the lights right onto the circuit board requiring disassembly to replace them! I really hope that removing the gauge needles is not required to fix this. Where is a good source of switched ignition power inside the cabin? There's an ignition fuse in the panel on the left side of the dash, is that pre or post switch/relay? I have a squeak coming from somewhere behind me, must be something in the cabin in the back seat area. Are there any known likely culprits? The stock audio system has got to go eventually, but I want to use it for the time being and spend energy on other things I want to modify. I'll be fine if I can add an aux input into it. Has anyone used the PAC AAI-GM12 module to add an aux in port? I have facctory XM, the head unit is the in-dash 6 disc changer version. Thanks!