needing a new wiring harness. Up date 03-14-22

[Pa PITT]

.... SO GUYS my hunting Buddy is needing a new wiring harness for his Bronco.
So A little history. He's had to put another motor in his Bronco .
His Bronco is a 1966. It now has a 1987 Lincoln 5.0L HO motor . This motor has been rebuilt by our local Machine shop . Whom has been one of our hunting buddies . SO Saying we TRUST this man.
.... Last motor .. Another 5.0 but The mechanic that put it in ... He insisted that my Buddy let him do the overhaul & That Guy ripped my friend off big time . It had 2 different heads put on it . & My Friend was charged for .030 over pistons . But when It went to our local Machine shop .. t still had std pistons in it .
SO ... b/s begins . & a different tech has put in this new motor ... It's in after a year. But now this Guy ... ''NOT A CHOOSE OF MINE '' i never have trusted this tech.
But I did trust the 1st guy who screwed my Buddy the 1st time .
.... But this 2nd Tech has done nothing but bad mouth no.1 from the start.
..... But after he got the new motor installed . He has cut my Buddy's wiring harness to pieces & cut out stuff & It still won't run.
...............
.........SO BUDDY has his Bronco back at his shop finally... & He's going to get a no.3 tech to get it running .
... I told him He just needs to buy a new wiring harness .. Because his harness has been cut to pieces & Re-spliced too many times .
Money i=s not much of a issues with My Buddy . If it need it ..then just do it.
... so Which Wiring harness does he need to buy now . He'll need the under dash harness for his 1966 &He'll need the Motor harness for the 1987 HO 5.0L
.. so What Brand.. Painless or Ryann.. or Cen-Tec .. or which one are we calling the best for this install.
... Last time we used part Painless & Our member her from Calif to re do the Motor side ... But both the 1st 2 mechanic have cut & Spliced it so much. It's no long suitable ..
SO BUDDY IS JUST GOING TO START OVER . & SPEND ANOTHE 2 GRAND to get his Bronco running again.
He's got about 30K into this thing over the last 15 years . It's not perfect but he's tried hard to fiz it correct & He loves to drive it .
SO I told him today .. Just start over & Get it fix proper Weather it 2000 or $4000.oo .. Just do like you've always done .. Getthe best & put it all new back into it .
SO WHICH WIRING HARNESS...

 

[txtruk15]

I'm running an '87 mustang 5.0L EFI in my '70. Painless, Ron Francis, American Autowire, Centech are the big ones. I went with American autowire made for the bronco, since I didn't need all the bells and whistles that the Painless had, but if money was no object, the painless is a great one and is sold by the vendors on this forum also....

Paul has some great advice in this thread to help figure it out...

What Wiring Harness?

there's been lots of wiring harness postings and I've read them all and am still unsure of the best wiring harness to buy for my situation. I do know that the wiring has been a conglomeration of 50 years of crazy add ons and splicings, and I'm finally at the point to just re do everything the...

classicbroncos.com

 

[Steve83]

I always use the donor engine harness, and often as much of the donor vehicle's harness as I possibly can (because it's more-modern & -reliable, and supports more features/mods/upgrades).

(click this text)

 

[Pa PITT]

Well we sent the original harness to CALIF About 2 years ago .. But now it's been cut & spliced too many times.
DOES the Auto Wire make a Motor EFI harness..& A UNDER DASH HARNESS.
.
I BELIEVE his head Light & rear light harness will be fine..
If we can just buy those 2 harness..
.........
If not then Which of the others will be the easiest to adapt to his Bronco .
I may be wrong but I believe all of the Good ones will need some amount of tweaking.
Tell if I'm Wrong ... It'd be nice to buy one that will just plug & play for the 99% correct 1st time.

 

[Jdgephar]

Pa, is he running EFI, or just needs the Bronco wire harness?

Sent from my SM-G981U using Tapatalk

 

[txtruk15]

Well we sent the original harness to CALIF About 2 years ago .. But now it's been cut & spliced too many times.
DOES the Auto Wire make a Motor EFI harness..& A UNDER DASH HARNESS.
.
I BELIEVE his head Light & rear light harness will be fine..
If we can just buy those 2 harness..
.........
If not then Which of the others will be the easiest to adapt to his Bronco .
I may be wrong but I believe all of the Good ones will need some amount of tweaking.
Tell if I'm Wrong ... It'd be nice to buy one that will just plug & play for the 99% correct 1st time.

Ron Francis makes an EFI harness but it's pricey.... https://www.ronfrancis.com/product/496

 

[Pa PITT]

SO Great Funny Result.
It's not home yet But ... Here's the Story for today.
...........
..... So I met my Running Buddy for dinner & The we went back to his shop & got it pulled out side to load on another Buddy Car Trailer .
It was easy to load .. & NO Issues to take it to the new Mechanic . We got it there About 50% of the people who lived in this town had to drive by as I was trying to back the trailer into his shop. ..
.. SO WE HAD More Good Luck getting it place inside his shop. THEY open the Hood & He looked it over. He was Kind like I was .. THIS
REWIRE Looks like a problem. & This is nasty . I pointed a couple of wrongs & He pointed at a couple of issues .
He said dang it looks like he at least put on lots of new parts. Every thing looks nice .
I kidded him & said It's going to be something Stupid I'll bet .. '' I HOPE YOU FIND A BLOWN FUZE''.
SO WE got the Trailer back to the 3rd party helping us.
& While we were still at his house & My Phone rings . Tech says I got it running.... I went to laughing & He said I didn't even get to looking at the fuzes.
But He changed a couple of wires & Cranked it up. Then he said ... It really smells like the fuel is bad.
But he said He doesn't have the Fuel pump hooked up correctly. bUT THAT DIDN'T REALLY KEEP iT FROM RUNNING . AN EASY FIx.
THEN The tech didn't have the Elec. cooling fan connected correctly . It was hooked straight to the battery.& It had no sensors in it's wiring & No relays .
Then something on the Senoulid was not correct. But when he swapped out that . & Hooked his remote starter switch . It cranked .
.... SO He said he'll hook up & check out a lot of the other wiring .. & I'm Thinking I'll take him about 10 gallons of fuel over tomorrow morning & some containers to put the old gas in. .
He'll drive it & determine if it's really running as good as he thinks at this time .
& The funny part of this is, that tech WAS Definability was not my choice . I'm not fond of that Tech.
& He's since closed his shop & went to the new Ford house in our town. Wonder how long he'll last.
.... Now this new Tech Jerry, was a customer of mine at my old store.& He worked at the old Ford house for about 20 years . UNTIL HE RETIRED
then He worked about another 4 years at a Big truck repair shop .
I picked him. & I think he took this job just as a favor to me..
I'm still laughing that he got it running before we had got back home.

 

[Pa PITT]

SO This evening I went over to the next town where Buddies Bronco is now.
The new Tech reached over & cranked it up & Let it run for about 5 or 10 minutes.
It sure did idle sweet. BUT HE hasn't gotten to drive it yet. .. HE' WAS busy selling his Mustang TODAY..

 

[Pa PITT]

ok SO TODAY IS Saturday the 19th.
Running Buddy & I went over to check on the Bronco this morning .
When we got there & The tech has it setting there Idling ..
The biggest issue . This Tech has found so far .... IS LACK OF GOOD GROUND . GUYS & GALS. Remember you've got to have good battery cables .
Buddy has new every thing ... But Tech said it needs new cables .. These are too small. & old ... IT HAD Cables from the 87 Lincoln That the 5.0L came from. ALL The new parts this Bronco has on it & Some one of the previous techs used the old cables .
...SO NEW TECH had bought 1 ga. & Put on new copper eyelets & Military top post clamps .. & When he'd cranked it after It got warmed up say 10 minutes of running . Before It had issues of turning over more than a few turns at maybe 300 or 400 rpms .
New Starter & New Battery both rechecked good. . SO WHEN HE ADDED THE NEW 1ga... VER'ROMMM. It spun faster than it had when cranking cold.
...... SO AFTER THE CABLES were put on ... He said several more Dash Items started working .. / gauges on dash./.
SO It was killed & let set several times as we discussed more items.
.... & Before we'd got there He'd taken it around town for a drive..
....................................He SAID IT RAN GREAT.........................
iT'S NOT READY TO GO HOME YET BUT IT'S ALIVE ...
WITH OUT the 1st wiring harness even needing to be checked out. & Definitely not replaced . & Not another new computer.
.. SO HE SAID He'd hook up several more loose wires lying around & Check anything else He can think of to go over .
But it looks like it's alive .

 

[bigmuddy]

Great news for your buddy Pa!

 

[Pa PITT]

Even better new ...WE'RE GOING TO GO GET IT IN THE MORNING... tHIS WILL BE THE 1ST IME HE'S GOT TO DRIVE HIS BRONCO in about a year & 3 months +r-.
... He'll drive it & give it his approval . & Put some miles on it & determined if it has any issues..
I'll try & give another update in a few days .

 

[Pa PITT]

So I drove him over to get it this morning . Tech had not cranked it So it was still completely cold.
So he had to crank it about 3 or 4 times. . Which is the same as it was before this motor was overhauled.. SO It cranked & ideled ok after it's minute warnedup. After that it runs good .. SO After paying his bill .. $227.50 parts & labor. Buddy gave him 250.00& said ... & a BIG THANK YOU.
...& Can you believe, Let's put a few wires in the correct place & Wah la. & Motor runs.
Buddy said he need to go get his license plates . & He'll be driving it tomorrow ...

 

[Pa PITT]

OK So Brother Al & I went to coffee this morning & I road in his old 66 Bronco .
It has it's normal hard start. Meaning it cranked & died a couple of time then cranked & AS HE FEATHERED THE throttle it began to run &after a couple minutes We drove off.
But this motor at some stops or stop lights setting still ... one time it'll idle perfect & Next time It raises & lower changing RPM's about 300 rpms.
To me this motor does seen to run slightly better than it did before it was overhauled about 12 to 15K ago.
A different machine shop '' Our choice machine shop'' Did it for buddy this time..
We now don't think the 1st tech back a few years ago ...We don't really think he overhauled this motor like he was supposed to have done..& It had just had slight issues that got larger with time.
.... But at least Buddy is driving his Bronco now . & I THINK WE'LL be able to get it straightened out in time .. At least it's running again.

 

[Pa PITT]

OK I just got back home from a little trip to pick up a 1951 truck F2 From Arkansas .. Story in off topic.
But I'M SUPPOSE to eat noon with Bro Al. & I'll get some more info on how the Bronco has performed over the weekend .
Update later .