Smoking wire, headlights and pwr brakes failed. **SOLVED!**

*****FIXT!!!!!!!!!!*******

Sonofabitch. I found it. Burn marks on the hood. Bam. The hood was contacting the battery posts when it was totally shut. SONOFABITCH. Hooah!

i dont know what that sensor is. its pretty dark but if you had sparks flyin out of your e brake then id start there and see if u can see what wire touched what b4 another fire starts lol. i had this problem with an amp wire coming loose while i was drivin and it caused everything electric to shut down. just like when my alternator went bad. just alot more sparks and flames. if you have an aftermarket radio it might be wired str8 to ur battery with no fuse. maybe coulda been an old wire with a nick in it. hell idk jus a thought. look where the sparks came from lol. good luck

The thing circled in the picture above ended up being my aftermarket thermostat. I clipped it off and taped it for now. That solved the problem, but it started smoking wires again! My brake fluid line even heated up. I found a little ground wire in the engine bay and wrangled it out from underneath my truck. It was my brakelight harness. Unraveled the tape and it's just a stand alone wire, thank god not part of my wire harness. Shoulda been taped separately and fused.. I think it might be the "Resistance wire", I'll learn to read electrical diagrams and post back. Hooray! Mystery solved I think!

So now my question is what caused it.. Just a short in the wire? Or was there a buildup of electricity somewhere and it decided to burn this wire? My fuses not being of the correct amperage might have something to do with it..

hope u figured it out man. now that i look again that sensor is your tempature sensor. if all else fails unplugg your choke from the back of alt. i got a new alt and all the plugs mached but when i hooked my choke up, wires were meltn and i had no lights or anything and shit melted. i have no clue y but like i said, worth a try if the problem continues. i think when the choke and temp sensor are unsuccessfull at communicating, or get the wrong current, they both throw voltage witch may cause a short. im not positive tho but i think its somthing of that nature.

Ah ok I'll try that, thanks mazdafvr. I clipped the aftermarket thermostat off, hope it doesn't cause a problem, what do you think?

Update: Looks like the ground wire that burnt went from the sedimentor, to the fuel tank [or ground? I forgot.. crap], and then follows the rear harness all the way up into the engine bay, only to ground out onto the body. Now I'm wondering what the hell this ground wire is doing. Someone has redone this harness before, and I think they might have screwed up. Why would the sedimentor and fuel tank need a ground connection 10 feet away on the other side of the car? If this wire is solely for the sedimentor and fuel tank, can't I just ground it out nearby and then problem solved? Maybe it's grounded away from the fuel for safety, would that make sense?

Anyone out there got a diesel b2200 they could look at and see if they have this same wire?

Oh and the auto store guy told me it's probably grounded in the engine bay because there is a better ground there.

My other question is why did it burn? If it's a ground wire and it shorts out against the body from a nick, that would just ground it more, not run excessive current, right? So a hot wire must have shorted onto this wire, yes? Wtf is going on with these wires, please help me