Fairfield County, Ohio, USA | Hi all,
We have a pull-type sprayer behind a John Deere 4440. I've had past threads on this sprayer, I hate it. But I haven't made any changes to it yet, so none of the other threads are relevant to this problem.
There are two harnesses between the sprayer and tractor. #1 is for Ag Leader, and it connects the InCommand 1200 in the tractor to the DirectCommand L2 on the sprayer. #2 is what the sprayer was originally equipped with, and at this point is only used for a) power to the 12V rinse pump, b) activating a hydraulic diverter for boom control, and c) foam marker control (which we don't use).
On Saturday, dad discovered that the #1 (Ag Leader) harness had been badly damaged. It looks like it slipped out of the hook it had been hanging on, and must have gotten caught in/around the hitch. Photo attached. My brother cut each of the strands, put spade connectors on them (didn't have any butt connectors on hand I guess), and then wrapped each strand in electrical tape. He's pretty confident that he did a good job at it.
He started up the InCommand, which didn't raise any errors -- it started talking to the DirectCommand L2, and he had it open a valve.
The #2 harness does not appear to be damaged. In the tractor, it connects to a 'control box' that we mostly ignore, and that gets power from an Ag Express AE6601 power bar in the tractor cab. The power bar is connected to the left-hand 12V battery, and there is a fuse (either 20A or 30A, can't remember which) in line.
In order to use the sprayer rinse pump, the power bar needs to be turned on. He turned the power bar on, then climbed down and started the rinse pump, and started loading the sprayer. (He uses the rinse pump for rinsing bottles and rinsing the eductor.) "A little while later", maybe 10 minutes, The rinse pump stopped operating. There's a power light on the sprayer trailer for the pump, and the power light was off. So he climbed back up in the tractor and found that the power switch on the power bar wouldn't move. The rocker switch was in the "closed" position, where he left it, but I later determined that it was electrically "open". That's when he called me.
I used a multimeter to determine that there was no power flowing through the power bar, only on the switched lead. The in-line fuse near the battery terminals was not blown (and indeed I still saw voltage on the non-switched lead on the power bar).
Because we were short on time, and I didn't want to rush through this and blow something up, I told him to give up for the day, and we'd ask for help from someone better equipped on Monday (today).
My concern is that I have no idea why or how that switch would have melted. If there was far too much current going through it, shouldn't the fuse have blown? (It didn't, I triple-checked.) It seems incredibly suspicious that this happened immediately after a repair was needed on the other harness. I'm worried that there's some kind of... I don't know, ground fault? Or something that I just don't understand. I can't afford to replace an InCommand (or for that matter DirectCommand L2) if I accidentally blow it up. The Ag Leader harness, for what it's worth, gets its power from the right-hand 12V battery, and its fuses were not blown either.
I have a call in to AgExpress, but haven't gotten a call back yet. Their support department said that I need to talk to repairs, and they'll get back to me as soon as they can. In the meantime, I've ordered a replacement power bar with next day shipping.
Anyone have thoughts to share? :(
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 IMG_2299 (full).jpeg (166KB - 85 downloads)
IMG_2301 (full).jpeg (286KB - 86 downloads)
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Electrical problem, not sure where to begin troubleshooting (pull sprayer)
