got tired of staring at the ron francis retro kit on the floor and never driving the galaxie for fear of jacking my insurance for no inspection. in mass thats a fine plus points on your license for 6 years so i didnt want to take the chance. also heard horror stories of insurance companies denying claims if the car wasnt inspected. so i finally grabbed the nuts and started to dismantle all the old fubar'd wiring. managed to keep most stockish pieces intact just in case and took lots of photos. still need to pull up the rockers and part of the rug to get at additional wires. i wont lie i am petrified lol. taking a running car and making it yard art for a while isnt great on the ego. hopefully the experience of doing this myself - with at least some modicum of success - will help. ive wired bikes from scratch before but never a car with lots of lights, switches, etc. oh man what have i done.
Don't sweat it. I did my 66 in a weekend. Best advice I can give you is to plot it. Get everything separated, get the extra circuits clipped, and get the fuse box in place. Mounting my damn fuse box was one of the biggest headaches.
Hey, neverwinter, calm down. I know that guys with less intelligence than you have done this exact job before. I rate your intelligence fairly high since there are no spelling mistakes in your post. (smiling) Just treat it like eating an elephant. One bite at a time. If all we tackle in life are the easy projects we've done before then we'll never elevate our skills or confidence. Go for it!! Take your time and as stated above, lay it the harness out both in your mind and in/on the car. A bit of putting it on paper wouldn't hurt. Go slow and you'll be fine. And, let us know how it went when you are done.
System by system. Ignition, lights, signals, etc. If you have instructions that are printed on both sides or have illustrations, copy those pages, so you don't have to flip pages. Works for me, I hate being on step 3 and having to flip 2 pages to see an illustration. Really grinds my gears.
well took the day off to start attempting wiring. not a success. at all. supposedly the install is 3 hours lol - yeah right. the ron francis kit has 1/2 GM pieces and connectors and 1/2 Ford. on top of that there is a single wire to power the wipers which means i need to reuse the stock wiper to motor harness i would assume? the instructions say to unbundle everything - which i did and then had to promptly use 30 zip ties and spend an hour re-routing them all so i could get a semblance of an idea how to mount it all. in no way am i stating that i am absolved of any screwups, i just dont understand some of heir decisions regarding parts and wiring. in retrospect i wish i had ordered the seperate bits from dearborn and just plug and play the pieces. i have a friend coming over on sunday to lend a hand. hopefully he is better suited to this than i. what a fiasco.
The one step at a time advice is good, but in addition make sure you plan things geographically. That's to say, figure out all the stuff that gets wired in a particular neighborhood of the car and decide how it will be routed. Doing them one system at a time without considering this ends up with rat's nest wiring. Don't ask how I know....
Oh No! Put it all back! My son and I use only EZ-Wiring kits. I know there are better and vendors right here. I am not advertising just telling you my kid has been wiring cars since he was nine. Yes nine years old. They all run and none that I know of has burned up...yet! Start with one circuit like getting the car runable. Then go to front lites, etc. If you run into trouble call the company. Or buy lots of beer and call your car guy friends. Don't pass out the beer till the car is finished.
I helped a friend rewire his 53 chevy pu in two days. I did from the door forward and left him to do the rear lights, day two was spent finding and fixing his mistakes. It's not hard if you break it down.
Think of it this way; Power goes from the battery to the part you want to light up/run. Then it must go to ground to work. You have two systems that are independent of each other. One works all the time, lets call it "always hot". The other only works when the ignition switch is on, we'll call that "switched power". The "always hot side gets it's power directly from the battery. The "switched power side gets it's power from the "IGN" side of the ignition switch which gets it's power also from the battery. Lights, brake lights, horn need to be hot all the time. most every thing else is "switched". Your charging system only deals with charging the battery. That's all it does. Your starting system is off the "Switched" side of the system, or else the starter would run all the time. Starting circuit does nothing but spin the starter, and power the coil. Your new harness should be marked along each wire as to where they go. It's not magic, it does however, take concentration. I wired my 47 from scratch. Never done it before. You can do this. If you have done motorcycles, you can do this. It's the same, it's just more circuits.
I used terminal blocks and ring connectors rather than crimps. Especially where the headlights and front markers take place. Easy to test and troubleshoot if needed. My two cents
If you're doin' it yourself, take the old harness and staple it down to a piece of plywood the way it lays out in the vehicle. Match it or customize it with new as you use the model and you can hardly mess it up as far as lengths and such.
you can do it--as all have said, take your time and do one circuit at a time--sort wires where they go and temp bundle them with twist ties that come in garbage bags and such. Just did a 51 F1 from scratch with lots of amenities. I'm old and slow and it took me 32 hrs but all wires are in cover and routed so they cannot be seen but still accessible for testing/repair. Think it through and take your time. You can do it!!
i used a wiring kit once, not a piece of cake if you ask me. i wire all my cars but one wire at a time method. works better for me and i put in the circuits i need at the time and save space for expansion. im old but that works for me.
Hey, stop talking about me! Seriously, you can do this. Take it one step at a time and take your time. Wiring/electrical was always intimidating to me, but like you, I jumped in and did it. When I got done everything worked like it should. It was a freakin miracle if you ask me. Keep at it.
NeverWinter you got this!! I am about to re-wire my 54 and I to feel I little overwelmed, but doing it yourself really gives you pride in what you can accomplish!!! You got this bro!!! Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
You are a better man than I am. (see wife"s car in avatar) .....and the windshield wipers are now run by a chrome toggle switch located under the dash, if that makes you feel any better. On the good side, everything works but the clock...and I'm determined to MAKE that work someday soon.
well after 1.5 days we have PROGRESS! - car runs again - fuse blocks mounted (poorly but in place for now) - wipers work - horn works - hi and low beam headlights work - park lamps work - new light switch installed - new floor dimmer switch installed - TURN SIGNALS in front work!! - factory steering wheel (well its from a Falcon but better than the Cheech and Chong one that came with it) moving on to rear of car tomorrow and then to all the idiot lights etc i have to say i rate the Ron Francis Retro kit a C+ at best. In retrospect I should have gone with Rebel Wire. almost 1/2 the cost and most likely the same effort. the Ron Francis was SUPPOSED to be cut for a 1964 FORD Galaxie - not a generic hot rod or a GM or anything else. i paid the premium based on talking with the Ron Francis rep who stated all wires were going to be cut to length FROM THEM and that the harness was built specifically for my car. Maybe I was wrong, but I assumed that ,meant factory connections, etc etc. This was absolutely not the case. on top of that ALL Of the connectors are for either GM or aftermarket parts. The ignition switch connector was for a GM, as was the steering column connector for the signals, etc. None of the terminals mated to what my car had, and on top of that most of the terminals they provided fit VERY loosely. The instructions may have been more effective if they simply omitted them. We will make it work and I will most likely never again buy one of their products again. Between myself and 2 buddies we have 4 harnesses that we need to purchase. That's $1200 American dollars they may lose out on. In fact I am calling tomorrow to see if there is anything they will offer as an apology of sorts. I'm not holding my breath lol!
congrats it is reallynot that bad once you dig in. and good info on the harness. i will probably do my car this winter.thanks man!
This thread confirms my belief that it's best to buy a factory reproduction harness compared to a universal rewiring harness. For a few bucks savings the labor/confusion/frustration isn't worth it.
Missed this part by the sound of it... He thought he WAS getting a harness designed for his car! I hate it when manufacturers misrepresent stuff. QUOTE: neverwinter "the Ron Francis was SUPPOSED to be cut for a 1964 FORD Galaxie - not a generic hot rod or a GM or anything else. i paid the premium based on talking with the Ron Francis rep who stated all wires were going to be cut to length FROM THEM and that the harness was built specifically for my car."
that is correct Hackerbilt - i DID pay a premioum for what i thought i was geeting. What i was told was that the wires etc were to be cut at the length of my stock ones, etc. sure - a few extra lengths etc is fine - i dont expect them to know EXACTLY what my dimensions are. But to get a GM column mounted ignition switch for a FORD dash switch? the foot dimmer switch didnt mate up. had to dismantle and decipher the turn signal switch too. i bypassed the neutral safety switch because theirs doesnt identify what to do with the 2 remaining wires my stock unit has. there is only 1 wire for the wiper so had to splice that into the factory wiper harness. etc. again maybe i expected too much. but for somethinng that i was assured was plug and play and "should take 3 hours" - well that is just bogus advertising. seriously - half the instructions were for IDIDIT columns and aftermarket parts. WHY? i bought a FORD GALAXIE harness? next time its Rebel Wire, good quality better price, a HAMB vendor, and same or maybe even less work. - jason
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