I turned the key in my 1996, all power died. Then a minute later came back on for no reason

I would appreciate any kind of help, I'm hoping someone has had this happen to them. I walked out to my car tonight, turned the key, all lights went black. No horn, no lights, nothing, no juice at all.

I opened the hood and the terminals were tight and clean, battery only 2 years old (even if it was bad, I'd still have some lights or something). The ground wire coming from the terminal to the fender was there and looked tight and not corroded.

I went back to try the key again AND IT STARTED LIKE NOTHING HAD HAPPENED, except all the radio presets were gone and it was running rough like the computer was resetting itself.

What in the hell? It's like a breaker was tripped and then came back on by itself. What could have happened? It's been running fine ever since.

The only thing I can think of is I replaced the key cylinder ignition with a unit from NAPA. But it was a good $60 unit, not some cheap Chinese key cylinder from ebay. Also, let's say it was a bad ignition switch, why would that cut off all power to my radio so I lose the station presets?

Pretty shaken up over this becuase I don't have a dime to spare to put it in a shop or rent a car to get to work. Hopefully someone's had this happen and has an easy fix for it.

 

This happened to a Subaru I own. If your battery is really corroded clean off the terminals. You can get a really cheap battery cleaner from harbor freight. Use water and baking soda on the terminals then use this battery cleaner to get the corrosion off. You can also just use a brush or sandpaper with the the water and baking soda.

My Subaru also had two bolts that secure the leads to the battery. One bolt was tight the other was loose and I tightened it down.

Easy fix I hope this is it.

 

You can also take the truck to autozone and they’ll load test your battery for free. Might be worth a shot just to make sure something isn’t wrong with it

 

Thanks, I[ll take it to napa today and test the battery