Interior refresh on the 64

[vaughn3031]

In the process of redoing the entire interior of my 64. Currently dealing with 58 years of backyard wiring haha

[RivNut]

Hope that you're not color blind.

[vaughn3031]

hahaha no kidding. really wasn't that bad, just was a lot of T-Taps and twist/tape crap going on.  Cleaning up the harness and should be finishing putting in the aftermarket gauges in the next few days. 

[60FlatTop]

I removed, unwrapped, and repaired the wiring harnesses of my '64 quite a few years back.

 

Lisle makes a really good terminal tool available on Amazon and Ebay.

And Year One makes a good non-adhesive harness tape I duplicated the original wrapping with: https://www.yearone.com/Product/1967-81-firebird/hwrap

 

Lots better than picking up a roll of sticky electric tape.

 

[vaughn3031]

thank you sir! 

[60FlatTop]

Here is another tip from my harness job.

 

You will find that the harness wrap goes easier if you put some tension on the branch sections. I made this simple tool back in the 1990's. It is in my electrical cabinet when I need a third hand.

 

 

[60FlatTop]

One more thing, as Colombo says. These burnishing or scratch brushes are great for cleaning corrosion on electrical parts.

 

https://www.amazon.com/Pixiss-Scratch-Brush-Pen-Set-Fiberglass/dp/B07M94Y12J/ref=bmx_dp_ierwn32o_1/143-6769969-4632630?pd_rd_w=LK2kd&pf_rd_p=e6cdd6e6-4670-4642-bb47-67097bcd49dd&pf_rd_r=7P5RSDCKSNNCPK09H6DK&pd_rd_r=8065139d-f50d-4d6e-bb87-deff56f39deb&pd_rd_wg=V4Vsg&pd_rd_i=B07M94Y12J&psc=1

[rocketraider]

And here we thought only the Chevy and GTO folks had to correct Previous Owners'  Stamp!🤪

 

I'll be the first to admit one reason I got into the higher-line GM cars was I was tired of fixing Chevrolet wiring buggery. Even with the more complex B-O-Cad electrics, you rarely see any redneck engineering repairs on them.

[Jim Cannon]

Your interior looks like my car did about a year ago. I was digging down to the heater core, plus I replaced the bracket that holds the brake pedal up on the firewall. I also replaced the ignition switch and added a relay so that the switched accessory power no longer goes through the ignition switch.

 

While everything was apart, I cleaned the painted surfaces and polished all the chrome bits better than I could when they were on the car.

 

While you have it all apart, replace all of the bulbs with LEDs. The instrument lights really look good with LED.

 

I also put down new soundproofing, thermal/sound insulation, and replaced my carpet. It was a big job, but worth it.

[XframeFX]

15 hours ago, vaughn3031 said:

Currently dealing with 58 years of backyard wiring haha

For harness wrap, you want "self fusing silicone tape" in black and no thinner than 1 mil. It is now commonly found in box stores, the paint dept. for Home Depot.

You stretch it on with clean hands. It has a hi temp rating.

When installing the wrapped harness, you may want to apply a light wrap of cheap stuff to remove once installed. Silicone tape rips easy.

Scotch brand is over priced and I could only find it in gray 1/2 mil.

2 hours ago, Jim Cannon said:

added a relay so that the switched accessory power no longer goes through the ignition switch

Good idea!

[60FlatTop]

Most of the high electric loads go through the pins in the firewall bulkhead connector. They need to be checked thoroughly and the terminals can be removed from the plug using the Lisle tool to clean them. NAPA has a good selection of Balkamp uninsulated wire terminals if any need replacing to original.

You can avoid the crimp on terminals completely by sourcing the Balkamp parts.

 

I rarely splice a wire. If a wire needs replacing I will replace it all terminal to terminal. Sometimes it is hard to match an original color. A thorough cleaning with lacquer thinner and a coat of something like Krylon will get the exposed end correct if you are fussy. The Apple Green wire to my temperature sensor is painted about 6" at the end.

 

Consider relays for your headlights and other high loads. I have driven some cars, particularly Cadillacs that will have a warm ignition key after driving. I would suspect corrosion in the bulkhead connector first, second high resistance in the ignition switch. Building in a relay could saved an aging switch after eliminating the resistance point.

 

And always hang that belt with the steer horn buckle on a coat rack when working under the hood.

[arnulfo de l.a.]

On 1/16/2022 at 3:27 PM, Seafoam65 said:

 

9 hours ago, XframeFX said:

For harness wrap, you want "self fusing silicone tape" in black and no thinner than 1 mil. It is now commonly found in box stores, the paint dept. for Home Depot.

You stretch it on with clean hands. It has a hi temp rating.

When installing the wrapped harness, you may want to apply a light wrap of cheap stuff to remove once installed. Silicone tape rips easy.

Scotch brand is over priced and I could only find it in gray 1/2 mil.

Good idea!

Scotch 33 is the best on the market. UL tested and is rated to insulate up to 600v. Its all we used when i worked as a electrician. The cheap tape was used for attaching wire ends to a fish tape for pulling thru a conduit. Was removed and thrown away after wire pull. Could go through 10 rolls of the cheap tape  in a work day when pulling big wire. I would not use anything other than scotch 33 on a permanent installation. Good luck.

Edited January 19, 2022 by arnulfo de l.a. (see edit history)

[60FlatTop]

I found out about the Year One non-adhesive tape from a friend who had done a thorough refurbishing of an AAR Barracuda. He did his wiring harness with black sticky back electrical tape. Once he started driving his car the adhesive began seeping from the overlaps and making a mess. His research led him to Year One. He redid the job and the car looked great when he sold it a couple of years ago. I think he did that car in 1986-88. I did my Riviera in 1994 and it still looks good. I am pretty good at leaning from other's mistakes.

 

If you duplicate the original wrap you will find that each branch runs the tape to the extremity in a sort of tough shaped run and then lapped back to the "trunk". It is hard to manage that with sticky back. There is also a flip over draw knot at the termination of the wrap that is hard to do and make look good unless you use non-adhesive tape.

 

Overall my thoughts are that if a specialty hobby vendor offers a product I will spend extra to support their business as my part in helping them keep afloat.

[XframeFX]

On 1/19/2022 at 11:16 AM, 60FlatTop said:

If you duplicate the original wrap you will find that each branch runs the tape to the extremity in a sort of tough shaped run and then lapped back to the "trunk". It is hard to manage that with sticky back. There is also a flip over draw knot at the termination of the wrap that is hard to do and make look good unless you use non-adhesive tape.

I re-wrapped my instrument panel harness with a few extra circuits and kind of regretted taking it off. The original wrap was a work of art. Also, the tape that came off was quality stuff!

I use Scotch 70 self fusing silicone tape at work. So, I sourced 1 mil tape in black. It makes my work look professional even though I'm not as skilled as that craftsperson at Packard Electric Division back in '62.

 

On 1/19/2022 at 8:21 AM, 60FlatTop said:

Consider relays for your headlights and other high loads.

I swapped the 16 AWG circuit from the brights to the regular beam, switching wires at the dimmer switch and contacts for the sealed beam connectors. Then used the former regular beam 18 AWG wire to trigger a relay for the brights and high beam indicator. Ha, all this fussing and I'll never get to use the high beams as my Riv is just a weekend summer driver.

 

I took my fuse block apart, blasted the clips and sprayed them with 3M 97% zinc. All good now

[60FlatTop]

I ordered some of those scratch pens I posted a link to. They arrived today, look fine.

 

I wore out the ones I had back around the turn of the century and had not been able to find any. When I wrote the post I accidentally ran across the new name.

 

Talk about the "dumbing" down of America. Originally called a brunishing brush the tool got renamed to make it easier to understand and spell I guess.

[steelman]

18 hours ago, 60FlatTop said:

I ordered some of those scratch pens I posted a link to. They arrived today, look fine.

 

I wore out the ones I had back around the turn of the century and had not been able to find any. When I wrote the post I accidentally ran across the new name.

 

Talk about the "dumbing" down of America. Originally called a brunishing brush the tool got renamed to make it easier to understand and spell I guess.

Bernie, why is the Amazon link to these in Spanish? I thought you were from New York?

[SwedeDownUnderR63]

4 minutes ago, steelman said:

Bernie, why is the Amazon link to these in Spanish? I thought you were from New York?

It is in English for me. It could be some settings for you. Try Chrome incognito.

[60FlatTop]

2 hours ago, steelman said:

Bernie, why is the Amazon link to these in Spanish? I thought you were from New York?

I can't si why.