Hello, First timer here, so please be nice. I am not in the forestry industry, however I am quite interested in it and I am in need of more knowledge. However, that is beside the point. A few years ago I picked up a early 80's Cat 518 skidder to use at my ranch for general heavy duty tasks. It may be a bit heavy duty for a simple ranch, however I picked it up for $1500 bucks and it has always ran perfectly until this last weekend. When I went to start it, I had zero power. It was like the batteries were missing. However, I know that they are fully charged and not the issue. So, I looked into it further and noticed that a wire connector had come loose at the dash panel. I have no idea where this wire is to go. It is a red wire and it is coming off of the fuse which is located just above the starter switch. The starter switch has a black ground on negative pole, then a red wire onto the positive pole. From the positive pole, there is also my loose wire. If I work backwards, I noticed that the hot lead goes from the starter switch to the ammeter, and it appears that it should go to the fuse, but I am not positive on this. Can anyone help me figure this out, so I can get it back up and running. I believe I may be unclear, so if you have questions, hopefully I can clarify. Thanks for your help...
I can't speak to this particular machine but the battery wire coming off the starter would normally go the the other terminal on the ammeter from the one the switch connects to. Here's a typical wiring diagram: http://www.fwmurphy.com/uploaded/documents/pdfs/00-02-0207.pdf