rewire entire electrical system?

[spincast375]

Anyone who has done this, can you offer any advice? Vehicle is 20+ years old. Many ends have been cut, others are brittle and cracked, so there is just the bare basics. But no radio, defroster blower. Some online offer a wiring harness for $ 250, but no connectors. A brand new one from Chevy with connectors is $ 550. As my Blazer is a hybrid, one local electrical shop sid I could spend $ 2,000 before I am done. I am on a budget.

 

[cybrfire]

If I had to do it and had nothing to start with I get a hold of a painlesswiring kit. I bought one of their kits but I wasn't happy with the level of completion of the kit. Basically it was a ball of wires and a bunch of ends. I could make that myself so I returned it. What I ended up doing is visiting the JY and picking up a couple of harnesses for like 25 bucks total and putting together one good one from all three. Yes splicing but If you do it right there isn't anything wrong with a splice. Like solder connectors and heat shrink. It ended up taking less time than the painless kit would have and cost a whole lot less. I ended up driving that vehicle for many years and never had any electrical problems.

 

[Resurrection_Joe]

Get some giant spools of wire in various colors and gauges and a wirting diagram and go. Splice proper like the man said. I use terminal ends myself but soldering would be absulte final in reliability.

It isn;t hard, it just takes time, a LOT of time

 

[spincast375]

I can't believe only two guys in the entire world of Colorado K5 have done this.

 

[cybrfire]

If you have a large electrical supplier in your area, take a look at the connection ends on your wiring harness such as headlights and so on. If you can find those type of ends for the wires you can do the whole thing yourself. I don't know if it will save you any over a painless system but maybe.

 

[alec78]

I'm going to (once I have another vehicle to drive) do a mix of the posts thus far and then some.

Get a complete harness from a donor, get new wires and build the new harness from scratch. New waterproof ends, move fuse block and replace it with a USCG approved one. Add a few circuits. Also make a color wiring diagram if anything changes.

The plan keeps growing and the scarry thing is I'm looking forward to it! /forums/images/graemlins/yikes.gif ...and yes I am crazy...

 

[Z3PR]

There is nothing more frustrating then trying too fix f_cked up wireing. I recomend starting from scratch. rewire the whole vehicle. I find it easier too use a kit like "Painless Wireing". It's a PITA, but once you're done, you know it'd done right.

 

[tRustyK5]

I highly recomend the junk yard routine. I had 3 or 4 harness's left from parts trucks and each one ended up getting used on my truck at one point or another.

Under dash there are a couple of harness's that are separate from each other. Under the hood there are three harness's that are separate but come together at the fuse block on the firewall side. The one harness is for tailights, one for the headlights and one for the engine junk.

It's not particularly hard, just a little time consuming. The under dash stuff is the worst because so much of the dash has to be removed to get to it all.

Rene

 

[spincast375]

can you recommend a supplier for this kit?

 

[eightyone]

wen my truck had an electrical fire, i ripped out every last wire. i went to west marine and bought a toggle switch pannel with built in fuses and ran everything to a seperate toggle switch. you just run a possitive into the fuse block, then run a wire from each switch to whatever you want (like headlights and stuff) and then run another wire from there to the body for a ground. for the directionals, i used a 3 way toggle switch, and got 2 of those round direction fuses (not sure what there called) and did the same thing, except with those in the middle. and for the break lights, i ran a positive with an inline fuse tot he switch on the break pedal. i never ran reverse lights. and for the ignition, i had a push buton run from the positive, to the solinoid (sp?) on the starter. and i ran one of the toggle switches to the coil (went he switch was on, the truck would start, and wen it was off, the truck would shut off, and if you tried starting it with it off, it wouldnt run, it would just turn over. hope this helps ya /forums/images/graemlins/waytogo.gif

oh yeah, i had all the wire for free, and the connectors and switches were all under 100 bucks.