Need help identifying open wires. Pictures included.

[MrHenrietta]

Background:
New (to me) SMB
My house battery is dead so I haven't tested anything under the battery power just when the van is running.

Question:
I found 2 open wires in the bottom rear area of my van next to my inverter/charger. The wires come together in a small black tubing and go into my fuse box. Can someone tell me what these wires are for and if they need to be spliced together or are suppose to be connected to something?

Pictures of the wires:
http://imgur.com/eFFkd9g
http://imgur.com/a/GkDa7

Thanks in advance,

Mike

[86Scotty]

Do you have a test light or voltage tester to see if they are live? Or can you follow them in to the fuse box and tell (if they are hooked up to a fuse terminal)?
I have no idea what they might be for, most likely an accessory that was pulled prior to the sale, but you should definitely narrow down whether they are live or not.
Perhaps they will look familiar to someone.

[MrHenrietta]

Do you have a test light or voltage tester to see if they are live? Or can you follow them in to the fuse box and tell (if they are hooked up to a fuse terminal)?

I don't have a voltage tester currently and have not attempted to open up the fuse box yet to see what terminal they go to. I don't think they are live fwiw.

[mikracer]

I ran into the same thing when I first bought my SMB. Your best bet is to follow the wires back to the fuse box and see if they are connected. If they are connected to the fuse block, then like mentioned above, they're most likely for an accessory that is disconnected. I still have a set of wires (ground and positive) that aren't connected to anything, but I think it was for a cig lighter that no longer exists. I plan on putting one back where the former one was but havent done it yet.

If you have a Harbor Freight near you, you should pick up a voltage meter. It'll make troubleshooting these things much easier.

[daveb]

Strange they are both unmarked and black or are they? For the most part SMB wires all the AC devices using marked wires and use 3 solid conductor wire...black hot, white neutral, and ground either solid uncoated copper or coated green wire. Sometime makeshift electricians use cheap extension cord wire but usually even that has and oddball marking on the insulation or different color wire to indicate polarity. Mostly the same with speaker wire.

Tape the ends and follow it out like posted. It don't look like a pro did it but hard to tell by a picture. At least it's in flex tubing. Could even be audio wire.

[MrHenrietta]

Originally Posted by daveb

Strange they are both unmarked and black or are they? For the most part SMB wires all the AC devices using marked wires and use 3 solid conductor wire...black hot, white neutral, and ground either solid uncoated copper or coated green wire. Sometime makeshift electricians use cheap extension cord wire but usually even that has and oddball marking on the insulation or different color wire to indicate polarity. Mostly the same with speaker wire.

Tape the ends and follow it out like posted. It don't look like a pro did it but hard to tell by a picture. At least it's in flex tubing. Could even be audio wire.

Thanks for the reply. Yes it is black wire. The owner put in a nice sound system so it could be wires for an old subwoofer or something. I'm going to check out where they connected to inside the fuse box when I get the van out of the shop this week.

[tonyvoudy]

Originally Posted by MrHenrietta

Thanks for the reply. Yes it is black wire. The owner put in a nice sound system so it could be wires for an old subwoofer or something. I'm going to check out where they connected to inside the fuse box when I get the van out of the shop this week.

I am going to vote sub-woofer as well. looks like there was room to store one where the wires are located. Maybe call the previous owner to confirm?

[MrHenrietta]

Just talked to the seller. The wires were for an old sub-woofer.

[BrianW]

Mystery solved!

[daveb]

people pay extra for those pre-wire jobs