Hey guys, I went to start my truck yesterday and no dice. It's almost as if the battery is completely disconnected as I get no information going to my dash, and there is nothing cranking, not even my starter is activating.

Here is a video of what it's doing:
As you can see nothing on the dash is reading, not even the tiny LCD panel is showing anything. The radio does come on but that's about it. It's hard to hear but there is a clicking noise coming from what I believe is somewhere under the steering column. With the limited time I had yesterday the things I tried were checking the battery to make sure it has a charge, cleaned the terminals of any corrosion, and just visually checked fuses on the kick panel. Today I'm going to take a test light and start probing all the fuses down there. I did try to jump the truck with my other vehicle trying to rule out the battery altogether and I still get the same none responsiveness. Another thing I am going to do is check out the FPDM as I had heard that can also possibly cause this issue. I will inspect the starter as well to make sure that's getting 12v from the battery. It's hard to see from the video but when I turn the key off and pull it out, the security light on the upper dash does blink rapidly for 30 secs.

I just wanted to see if anyone had any other suggestions/troubleshooting tips to help narrow this down. It sounds like people with this issue usually have the dash light up and atleast give you some kind of readout on the tiny LCD weather its dashes or "check gauges"

 

the camera keep panning around, so difficult to tell anything conclusively.

Try a different key, does pats light probe out ?

Then hit the basics:

-have battery professionally load tested
- check/clean/tighten your grounds and main cables/connections (not just at batt terminals).
- scan for codes

 

I suppose the battery can still be an issue. However, wouldn't jumping the car with another battery and getting the same outcome tell me there's more to the problem than just a battery?
Finding all the ground connections will be fun!

 

Depends how crappy the battery in the truck is. Ive ran across ones with internal shorts that wouldn't even start with good jumper cables from another vehicle.
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You have a "chip key". In the steering column/dash area, there is a transceiver. It communicates with the key. It reads the key's RFID chip, and allows the car to start. If you insert a key without a chip, or a key which isn't programmed to the truck, the truck won't start. If you break the ignition and try to start the truck with a screwdriver, the truck won't start.


Possible that you have a bad transceiver. Possible that the wiring and connectors are compromised. Possible that your vehicle security system is faulty, and/or the wiring and pin connections are bad.

Of course, anything is possible. A rat chewing into your wires could be possible. Just a guess on my part. Maybe you'll look into it. Maybe you'll find a shop to hook up their computer and spend hours trying to diagnose it.

 

The problem is solved! It was a bad ground. Here's a picture of the culprit:
https://imgur.com/a/506aDWn

Not sure why the forums isn't letting me embed the picture, however this was the bad ground. This black and blue wire was located under the steering column. This ground location is found behind the hood latch plastic panel and if this doesn't tell you I live in the rust belt I don't know what would. I went ahead and used an already existing ground location that's about 2 feet above this one. There is another location closer to the steering column so I had options. Regardless, it was certainly a lesson that whenever you are experiencing electrical weirdness its always a good idea to check your grounds.

 

Amazing how bad grounds can cause a ton of issues.

 

wow that was a bad one! Thanks for reporting back; will help others who search/read later.

you can attach pics by using the paper clip icon above typing box (next to smiley).

if you didn’t check the other grounds make sure to at least check one below fusebox

 

wow that ground looks nasty. good catch! i'm always surprised how much havoc a bad ground can wreak.