1957 wiring harness.
anyone know about how long it takes to replace a complete wiring harness? and on a scale of one one to ten the level of difficulty. ten being very difficult.
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Re: 1957 wiring harness.
Bruce
That's a pretty tough question to answer. Too many variables. What is difficult for one person is a piece of cake for another. Are you doing this with everything in the car? On a one to ten how would you rank yourself as an electrician. Early on I never liked to mess with wiring, but not having the deep pockets to pay someone else I learned to wire a car myself. Can anyone do it, probably not, but I would say most can if they are a " do it yourselfer" and take their time and follow instructions. As far as how long it takes that depends on how good and how fast you are. Not something that should be rushed!
Terry -
Re: 1957 wiring harness.
Bruce,
First, there are several harnesses in your car. There is the front harness, referred to as 'lamp forward harness', engine harness, rear tail lamp harness, and power top, power window, if so equipped. The headlight and parking lights also have there own 3 wire harnesses. If your car has original harnesses, then they need to be replaced if you are going to drive it. They were not designed to last this long, and I am assuming the wires are hard, brittle, and cracked. These have been known to burn cars up.
The rear harness is the hardest, see my post from the last couple of days. In it Ed identifies the 2 most difficult areas you have to fish wires through. You have to do this correctly or you never will be able to do it correctly at all.
Otherwise, Terry's assessment asks the questions you need to ask yourself.
-Dan-Comment
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Re: 1957 wiring harness.
Dan it is the harness that runs under and across the dash and exits the fire wall on both sides of the car. I had a short somewhere that burned the tape off the harness and burned the insulation off one of the wires.I was changng the plugs and must have created a short. I was wondering if I could just replace that one wire? Everything seems to still work? thanks for your help. the car is together and complete. I do alot of work on my cars but have never replaced a wiring harness that's why I wondered how big a deal it was to replace this harness?Comment
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Re: 1957 wiring harness.
Okay Bruce, that is the lamp forward harness, and is the one that deteriorates the most as it is exposed to all the engine heat, and gas and oil fumes. That one is not too hard to do. You should also replace the engine harness that goes from the starter motor to the amp gauge on the right side of the car. That is also not too hard. These 2 harnesses are the most likely to cause shorts that burn things up. The rear harness is the most difficult to replace, but is the least likely to short out and burn.
You should be able to cut open the harness and replace that one wire. But if you cut open the harness you may find other wires have been heat damaged as well. Lectric Limited sells non-adhesive electrical tape for this purpose. But you need to access the condition of the harnesses in general. If they are hard and brittle, it is not worth taking the chance of losing such a valuable car. If you have a mostly original or Bowtie car, I can understand you not wanting to lose the originality. You can, and should, add a circuit breaker at the starter motor for protection in case of a short. This also has been discussed in a recent thread.
-Dan-Comment
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Re: 1957 wiring harness.
Bruce,
I have replaced a few and to me the only problem I had is identifying the colors.
My wife was a great help in solving that problem.
My advice is, purchase a large wiring schematic, carefully remove the old harness (take reference pictures prior to removing) , purchase a harness from a good source, lay the old and new harness next to each other and carefully compare them.
If they are the same start the installation process one wire at a time.
On a 57 Corvette the wiring diagram is WRONG for the amp meter so the wires need to be reversed, but check and double check before turning on power.
Working under the dash in a 53 to 57 is a pleasure compared to 58 and newer Corvettes.
Good luck.
Bruce BComment
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Re: 1957 wiring harness.
Bruce,
thanks for the tips. Would have never thought to compare the twu before installation. Have taken pictures. ordered from Lectric limited
BruceComment
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