Dash Board Wiring

[D&M2]

Hi Everyone,

Does anyone have any pictures of how you bundled, routed, and attached the dashboard wiring to the dash?

For my initial attempt at wiring the gauges, I tried to keep the wires relatively short and just ran them directly from one guage to the next. After pondering it for a while, I decided that the wires flopping around probably wasn't a good idea so I'm going back to redo the dash and wanted some ideas on how to do it better/right.

I'm thinking that I should run all of the wires thru a central bundle that I can attach to the dash and then break out the wires to run each gauge from the bundle. If the dash was wood, I'd could staple the bundle to the dash but with fiberglass I'm not sure what would be the best approach to secure the bundle while allowing it to be removed if necessary.

[trularin]

I can give you a few pointers for wiring.

1. Try to use solder and shrink-wrap-tubing. It will hold up much longer and will look better.
2. "Half a finger" service loop is good. If you have a harness running up the middle of the gages, just before you connect the wire, pull it over your finger.
3. Wire in one direction. If you like left to right, then do left to right.
4. Heavy plastic split harness dress make the job easier, It is a heavy plastic spiral that goes around the wires.
5. Color coordinate your wiring. Ever had to find the red wire and find more than one?
6. Use #18 wire as a minimum.
7. If you can manage it, a bundle connector makes working on electrical a bit easier.
8. Labels are great. Don't be afraid to label your wires.

There are several others that can be listed, but if you use a bit of common sense, it can be done with great results.

Hope this helps.

[Ron61]

Number 5 and Number 8 above are great as is all the rest, but those two are what I consider the most important to me. Also after I had mine all done. I used small zip ties at intervals to hold the whole harness from moving around any while driving the car. If I needed to do anything it was easy to take a pair of cutters and snip the zip ties to let me move the harness a little. I also drew a complete schematic on paper of each wire and where it was ran and even the ones that went into the engine compartment. I had about 8 sheets of paper showing relays, wiring, and connectors in a loos leaf notebook but they sure came in handy after a year of so when I couldn't remember exactly where a connector was or which wire went to which relay.

Ron

[Dwight]

Here are a few pics of Lawrence Perry's FFR wiring job. Labels are great in trouble shooting. Ty-wraps under the dash are a must t hold the wire bundles together, but you don't have to tie the wiring bundle to anything. Lawrence has connectors so he can remove the dash. Over the years I have added gauges and stuff. I wish I had connectors to make it easier to remove the dash. My wires are long enough that I can pull the gauge panel away from the dash so I can work on it. But I have to sit in the car to work on the dash wiring.
I don't have a pic of the dash just before he put the body on, but it was very neat.
Dwight

[D&M2]

Thanks for the tips and pictures. They should help make sure that the second time can be the last time (at least for a few years).

For things like the power and ground for the gauge lights, are these normally run in series or brought back to a central point? I can see benefits both ways. Using strips like in the pictures would certainly make bringing these connections back to a central point neat and easier to manage and wire up but would any power or grounding be lost using this approach?