Different vehicles have fuse box panels in different places. Read your owner’s manual or search online if you can’t find the fuse box panel in your vehicle. Note that some vehicles may have multiple fuse boxes.
What you ground the test light to depends on where the fuse box panel is located. For example, if it is located underneath the dash, the test light cable won’t reach the car’s battery. However, you could find a nearby bolt on the car door hinge. Any unpainted piece of metal on the vehicle will work to ground the test light. For instance, it could be a part of the metal frame under the hood or a nut or bolt on the engine block.
Note that you don’t need to have your vehicle or any of its accessories powered on to test a fuse and you don’t have to pull out the fuses to test them.
If you find a blown fuse, you can just pull it out with your fingers or a pair of pliers and replace it with a new fuse to fix the issue.
The 2 holes on each fuse are for testing the power in and the power out, so make sure to check both the holes to ensure the fuse is working 100%. If only 1 of the holes lights up the test light, the fuse is probably blown.
For example, if you’re testing the fuse that supplies power to the bathroom, turn off all the bathroom lights and unplug things like hair dryers from the outlets.
Your breaker box probably has a list of the breakers and the areas of the home that they correspond to, or it might have labels right next to the breaker switches themselves. Breaker boxes are usually located in a basement, garage, utility closet or kitchen. Some homes may have them in different places. If you aren’t sure where yours is, just look around for a panel on a wall that you can open up.
Some fuse panels have a grounding screw that you can attach the clip to. This screw is usually located just above the main breaker. If you aren’t sure, just stick to grounding the clip on the surrounding metal box.
Each breaker switch has 1 corresponding screw that attaches the wires to the switch, so it should be very clear which screw you need to touch to test each breaker.
If a breaker switch flips off before you can test it or while you’re testing it, and there is no electricity being used in the room you’re testing that fuse for, there could be a wiring problem. If this happens, contact a licensed electrician to come and check your wiring out and troubleshoot the issue.
You can buy a test light online for as little as $10 USD. You could also purchase one at an auto supply shop or home improvement center.
You could use any positive battery cable or a fuse that you know is working for this.
If the test light doesn’t light up, double-check that it is grounded or try a different power source. If it still doesn’t light up after testing it again, you may need to replace it.
