NA - New one on me: Rodents chewed wiring in my car NA

jsstevens

jsstevens

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jsstevens
I have a 2017 370Z. Thursday night I started the car to put up the roof. It ran just fine. Friday morning I started the car to go to breakfast and there's a hard miss. Entirely consistent. I drove gingerly to breakfast, drove home and called the Nissan dealer where I get it serviced. Drove it over there (still solid miss). Monday morning they send this picture. ~$1900 to replace wiring sub harness. Rodents (unspecified) chewed the harness and killed the injector on the #1 cylinder.

Some folks (including the service writer) say it's because of soy used in the wire insulation. Others (including the wire manufacturers) say it's just because rats chew things to keep their teeth from growing (which is true). At any rate, in my case, this is apparently because of Covid because I haven't been driving my car much and it's parked outside this year - which I hope to fix this weekend.

Insurance is now involved because it's covered under comprehensive... 370Z_pic2.jpg
 
Several cow-orkers have had to repair wiring harness issues due to the same thing. Rodents.
 
Yep, this happens. Seems to be especially predominant on Nissan for whatever reason..
 
Rodents have been bad this year, worse than we've ever had in this property. When we first moved to Kansas, we did have issues with mice making nests in my wife's BMW. We got some cats and that seemed to take care of the mouse issue, and we haven't seen many until this summer. We've had mice in the RV (caught 2 one day, a third last night), I've gotten 3 mice in traps in the garage in the past week, and I see them scurrying all over the garage and even in the basement, where I've never seen them before.

I'm not quite sure why we're seeing more of them in the house since if anything we're around more, but this is a bad year. Maybe the RV brought more mice with it.
 
I have a Caterpillar trackhoe made in Japan and the mice love it. They must think it is a big yellow block of cheese. I keep five mouse traps, poison blocks, rodent repellent bags in it at all times. Much worse in the fall than any other time of the year. I do not have near as much of a problem with any of my US made equipment as I do the machine made in Japan.Cat E120B mouse attack.JPG
 
jsstevens said:
Some folks (including the service writer) say it's because of soy used in the wire insulation. Others (including the wire manufacturers) say it's just because rats chew things to keep their teeth from growing (which is true). At any rate, in my case, this is apparently because of Covid because I haven't been driving my car much and it's parked outside this year - which I hope to fix this weekend.
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I dont think the 'soy' explanation is correct. We had the same problem 30-40 years ago, and back then wiring looms were insulated with PVC (like God intended). The explanation at the time was that the martens were attracted to the softeners used to make PVC pliable.
 
I had a brand new Jeep Grand Cherokee, about 2 months old, hit a bump and it died. So I called the dealership, they towed it, called me an hour later, found a mouse nest on top of the gas tank, they had chewed through the fuel pump wire, no warranty against mice. $350 later....
 
One word: dCon

I used to use mouse repellant. I had a verbal agreement with the mice. If they stay out of the house then I won't use poison. They broke their word.

Now I put the little dCon bricks all around under my house and also in the garage, barn and storage shed, in places mice go and cats can't get into. So far no signs of mice.
 
About 7 years ago, my father was having some work done to build a pole barn/shop so he parked the jet ski/trailer back near the tree line and covered it up (to keep it hidden from public view). Went to ride it the next summer and the speedometer/engine temp/etc. was all inop. Look back under the deck and see mice nests and chewed wiring. I just patched it up with solder/crimps and get it back operational. They chewed a few hoses as well which was letting in pressurized water fill the hull while the engine was running. I don't let him park stuff back near the tree line anymore, not that we need to since we have the shop built.
 
Zeldman said:
One word: dCon

I used to use mouse repellant. I had a verbal agreement with the mice. If they stay out of the house then I won't use poison. They broke their word.

Now I put the little dCon bricks all around under my house and also in the garage, barn and storage shed, in places mice go and cats can't get into. So far no signs of mice.
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I have two sheds, sealed them both up from rodents. Did the last one this summer, evicted 5 mouse families. Used great stuff to seal holes, plus some creative carpentry to make poorly designed door rodent proof.

My houses are rodent proof too, it takes a while to find all the holes, but it can be done.
 
About 23 years ago, I was working on a system undergoing production reliability acceptance testing. The system was outside and needed to run without failure or hiccup for at least 14 days. About 5 days into the test, the system did a shutdown due to a failure detected by one of the field monitors. Fortunately, the field monitor failure occurred because the fieldwire had been chewed by a marmot or similar animal... so the shutdown didn't count and the reliability test could continue.
 
Not a chewing story, but one morning after a really cold night in KS, my grandpa started his Cadillac and there was a big thump. He investigated and found a decapitated rat. He’d gotten on the engine block and fan pulley. He didn’t move fast enough when the engine cranked and it got him. Those cars had huge engines to pull all that weight around so I’m sure the rat didn’t bother the starter.
 
I spoke with the insurance adjuster. His work car had a dead battery from not moving. When he opened the hood there was a 30lb opossum on top of the engine.

Service advisor just called and they might have my car done tomorrow. He recommends moth balls in a sock jammed in a corner against the firewall.

Does that work?

John
 
Crashnburn said:
Not a chewing story, but one morning after a really cold night in KS, my grandpa started his Cadillac and there was a big thump. He investigated and found a decapitated rat. He’d gotten on the engine block and fan pulley. He didn’t move fast enough when the engine cranked and it got him. Those cars had huge engines to pull all that weight around so I’m sure the rat didn’t bother the starter.
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My daughter was driving to work one morning, she was about a hundred feet from the house when a mouse ran over the console right next to her arm, then up into the heater, which was running. She heard a little scream and an awful Brrrrrrrrrrrrt whappa whappa noise. She drove back, obviously wigged out. I gave her my car and took it to the mechanic as I didn't want to deal with mouse guts.
 
PaulS said:
My daughter was driving to work one morning, she was about a hundred feet from the house when a mouse ran over the console right next to her arm, then up into the heater, which was running. She heard a little scream and an awful Brrrrrrrrrrrrt whappa whappa noise. She drove back, obviously wigged out. I gave her my car and took it to the mechanic as I didn't want to deal with mouse guts.
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Eeew! I guess the first liar never has a chance!
 
jsstevens said:
I spoke with the insurance adjuster. His work car had a dead battery from not moving. When he opened the hood there was a 30lb opossum on top of the engine.

Service advisor just called and they might have my car done tomorrow. He recommends moth balls in a sock jammed in a corner against the firewall.

Does that work?

John
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Might work. The smell drives the varmints away - and it works with various critters. Somewhere I came across a suggestion to use Fabric Softener sheets in the same way. I have been testing the theory on
my son's car - which is sitting while he is overseas. So far (about a month) it is working (just checked). I am trying the same experiment with gopher holes in the yard. Too early to tell on that one.
If the idea works, Fabric Softener sheets are a super cheap solution.

I haven't had problems with chewed wires, but rats did a number on the vacuum hoses of a car of mine that was out of action for quite awhile due to a suspension problem.

Dave
 
We had rodents chew through the aluminum hydraulic lines to the nose gear actuator in the Citation; I never would have imagined.

I have heard of vehicles burning to the ground when they chew through the wires.

Someone remind me the importance of vermin to our ecology, please?
 
Anyone who lives in the rural midwest has probably had to deal with rodents chewing on wires in their inactive equipment at some point. It seems like every year there is a new surprise.

Some manufacturers seem to use wire with insulation that is more attractive to rodents than others. Thankfully I haven't had too much trouble with my personal vehicles and equipment.
 
I’ve taken to parking my cars (in garage but clearly not rodent proof) with the bonnets up. Rodents are drawn to dark, enclosed, warm spaces. So far no rodent nests on top of my engines as I’ve been troubled with in the past.
 
And some wonder why I’m hard on mice around here. Just in the last few weeks I caught about 9 in the shed. I freshened up my poison too.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
...Someone remind me the importance of vermin to our ecology, please?
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Around here they feed the raptors. We have numerous species of hawks and owls, including great greys and great horned, that hunt in the fields and pastures around my place.
 
GRG55 said:
Around here they feed the raptors. We have numerous species of hawks and owls, including great greys and great horned, that hunt in the fields and pastures around my place.
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Yup, you have to be careful with the poisons which in turn will poison the predators.
 
Rats chewed through a bunch of wiring in my wife’s Cayenne a couple months ago. Very uncool of them.. We need more garage space so I can get all the cars indoors...
 
RudyP said:
Rats chewed through a bunch of wiring in my wife’s Cayenne a couple months ago. Very uncool of them.. We need more garage space so I can get all the cars indoors...
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I had a problem with squirrels a few years ago. I was shift working and would get home after dark. In the colder months it seems the squirrels liked to take nuts under the warm hood and eat them. I found the problem when the cruise control quit working because the wires had been chewed through. But my problem wasn't near as bad as this:
 
I'm just kidding, I know full well the importance of rodents.
But I still reserve the right to hate the little buggers when they destroy things!
 
Daleandee said:
I had a problem with squirrels a few years ago. I was shift working and would get home after dark. In the colder months it seems the squirrels liked to take nuts under the warm hood and eat them. I found the problem when the cruise control quit working because the wires had been chewed through. But my problem wasn't near as bad as this:
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Mrs. GRG55 parked her pickup truck outside during summer to use her garage space for gardening stuff. One day she had trouble getting any power out of the engine at high throttle. The shop found the air intake filter housing jammed full of peanut shells. I put out whole peanuts in winter for the blue jays. Some enterprising red squirrels had helped themselves, stashed some away to be consumed later and used the air intake a disposal bin.
 
We've had squirrels chew on multiple vehicles destroying wiring harnesses, fuel lines and more. Would like to have one of these:
 
Our observation in the Midwest is mice are a worse problem moving in spring and fall when seasons change. Get them in the fall and they're probably not a problem all winter. Also a problem in the spring as they start roaming looking for food.

The house is pretty tight, but we'll get a couple each change of seasons. In the house, it's now become not only traps but also the little blocks of poison. No kids and no pets so we can get away with that. Little glue traps are of little use on mice - they get out of them. Use the rat-sized glue traps.

My combine has had trouble with mice chewing on wires (long before soy was used in wiring covers). It's common on the farm. I've used dryer sheets, the balsam scent packets (machinery dealer says after they wear out the mice use them for nesting material). I've had the best luck with moth balls. Of course, the combine smells bad next season but not as bad as trying to work around mice urine fixing wiring in inaccessible places. Also the coons like to get into the flighting. One year I shelled 5 coons out of the clean grain elevator when I started the combine up. A neighbor started his John Deer combine and shelled a coon hiding behind the radiator fan, to the tune of $1,000.

I've found that I've had good luck by opening everything up and taking shields off so there are no "hidey holes" that make good nesting spots.
 
I had mice eat the magneto wire on my lawn mower (and nest inside the engine housing).

When they built the (new) Denver airport they had a lot of problems with rabbits eating wires in the parking lots.
 
Would like to have a few barn cats about, but the dogs wouldn’t understand and cats decimate bird populations.
 
Most states covered by car insurance...A rat chewIng through a Mercedes or BMW wire harness and you will be happy to know this.
 
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