Just yesterday afternoon I replaced my totally crisped alternator wire harness to the fuse block and the fuse block itself with new ones, got them cheap off eBay.I also added thick copper strips to the fuse block contacts to increase the conductivity. When my block heated up it was VERY noticebly caused by the wafer thin contact strips that are made of some soft alloy that literally turns to ash eventually after repeated heating events; eventually breaking contact with the rest of the block and of course the heat begins to travel backwards up the alternator wire totally cooking it out. Mine was so bad if I bent it it would snap in half. Now that I have changed it all out all of my illumination is back to brand new and the car acts very responsive now. In all honesty I believe its the blocks contacts along with a bad voltage regulator on the alternator causing the meltdown. The block gets hot at different times not constant so that sounds like the voltage regulator putting out higher voltage than normal and at varying times, thats the same as the fuse block melting times. You may notice as well that the contact strips in the fuse block are stamped at differnt amp ratings from 100 on the alternator leads to 50 on other leads farther away yet the strips are all identical in thickness and composition? Thats odd. My alternator for my model year 2002 is rated at 120 amps? Thats higher than the fuseblock strip can handle according to the stamp max. amp rate.
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