All information for 1990 Corvettes provided by BadjerJim on CorvetteForum

Repair Information

Things you will need:
  • 7mm nut driver or socket
  • Time: 15mins
  • Relay – Advance Auto Parts – $3 (search part number RL36621)

The Starter Relay is located underneath the drivers hush panel under the dash.

  • Remove the carpeted ‘kick panel’ from the driver’s side. Here’s a picture showing the location of the seven 7mm screws (red spots are screw locations):
Picture
Kick Panel Screw Locations
  • Pull down the ‘kick panel.’ Be careful… there’s some wiring for the ‘vanity light’ in the driver’s foot well, and some other stuff. This will reveal a ribbed aluminum thingy that’s part of the heater/AC system, as shown in the following picture:
Picture
Wiring Behind Kick Panel
  • Pull your new relay out of the box, and look it over. Get a feel for ‘how big’ it is, because you’re gonna be feeling around in the dashboard in the next step.
  • Reach straight up behind the ribbed aluminum thingy, and then back towards you (toward rear of car). You’ll feel two relays to the LEFT side of the steering column. You want to remove the one CLOSEST to the steering column: that’s the Starter Enable Relay. It just pulls straight out (toward FRONT of car).
  • NOTE the orientation of the relay you’ve removed (where the spade plugs are, etc.). This makes it easier to install the replacement in the next step.
  • This crummy picture shows the relay removed. The red spot shows the approximate location of this relay, up inside the dashboard:

Picture
Relay has been removed from this connector. Red dot shots approx location of where relay can be found
  • Using the same orientation you noted in the previous step, insert the new relay.
  • Replace the kick panel. Done.


Start the car to see if this took care of the problem.

Bypass Information

For the truly ambitious, and to COMPLETELY make sure that this VATS Starter Enable Relay doesn’t kick your a** on a dark and rainy night, I would:
  • Pull apart one of these new $3 relays. The black plastic cover will pry off with a small straight-blade screwdriver.
  • Figure out which two contacts are related to a closed relay, and solder a jumper wire across them. Put the whole thing back together. Done.