When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
We gotta start a GoFundMe and get you a fiberglass dash! The cage looks bad ***.
Don't worry bro, I have plans for the dash, you will see the result later but one of the tasks is to cut everything I can out so it will just maintain enough structure to function, it's going to lose a feb LB's.
Now off to grill and drink some beers, work starts tomorrow ! Appreciate all the support from my bros, some of you have listened to me bitch, and bitch, and bitch some more. Thanks dudes !
Nice nice nice! Now you can breathe! I hate leaving my cars with other people to be worked on. I know it necessary, but when its needed, I can't breathe until it's back in my hands and I've checked it out to make sure it's OK. Maybe that's weird. Maybe that's why people own their own shops. My wife says, "it's just a car"...
Good luck with reassembly and have fun exploring the new capabilities of the outlaw police car.
So - 1st order of business upon getting the car back is to make sure it runs. Some of you may remember I got in my head it would be a good idea to "thin" out the wiring harness. With the removal of so many stock components, a ton of wiring was left that simply had no where to go. Well, those of you who know our cars know that there is a fair amount of interdependency in the electronics and, at least in my head, messing with the harness was fraught with danger.
So what do I do...
THAT, that is what I do.
So, being the smart guy I am, because there is no ECU or battery, or frankly a lot of other things I need to start the car during that process, I don't.... I didn't really think at the time it would be 5 months until I would get back to it. Haha... it was.
So, for a while, about 5 months actually I have had this nagging thought like... Man, I really hope it starts or I am in for a world of hurt of which I am not particularly adept...
I get the car in the garage and within a couple hours dash is back out, doors are off and I am starting to get the harness reasonably laid out. I then started to hook up all the things I knew would be required for the car to run - ECU, immob, ignition, dash and do a once over on both the fuse box and relay box to make sure all the wires I cut are not going to ground on something and create a bright, bright light. Reasonably sure I am good, I put the battery in and put power to the car... NO FIRE - YAY, then turn the key to the accessory position and holy sweet jesus did I get warning messages - Outside temp, oil level, fuel level etc... literally 10 plus errors. Remembering that outside temp error, I have seen before when one of the cluster plugs was not fully seated so I went back and double checked and yep, found one that faked me out. Fixed that, flipped the key to accessory and, No Errors.... Yay again.
Next I am ready to start, I cobble together a couple pieces of copper pipe to loop the heater core hoses together (she gone) and go to fire her up and.... NOTHING. No attempt to turn over, only after a couple times when I hold the key do I get a double beep from the horn. So what do I do, what any smart guy would, call a smarter guy ( @theprf ) and he says, did you plug in the little 2 pin connector on top of the ignition and I'm like - nope, I hope I didn't cut it off. Well, I didn't, I found I had run it in a weird way so it wasn't dumping out of the harness trunk in the right direction, the connector itself on the ignition in kind od nondescript so I missed it. Well, you know what ? I plugged that baby in, turned the key and she fired to life in a couple cranks !
SHE LIVES !
I killed it quick, I have some jenky stuff going on temporarily, but that was what I needed to know, it runs so I can move on to routing and securing the harness with minimal worry I will need to cut anything open.
Thank you @theprf - It was going to take me a long time to figure that out and you spat it off the top of your head.
So be a smart guy like me, when you're stuck - call a smarter guy !
Previously I had the Aim dash hardwired to the car. I tapped Can Bus coming from the rear of the cluster and switched power from the unused cell phone connector. The flying leads from the Aim harness were just soldered direct to these wires from the car. This made for a basically unserviceable setup and I knew I wanted to change to something that would allow me to pull the whole Aim harness out of the car easily.
So, I bought a Deutsch connector kit and used a 4 pin connector to make the aim install plug and play. Tested and it and we are all good - excuse the dusty aim, thats what happens when parts are in storage for 6 months I guess.
So here is my silly question from the back row; when I googled "AIM MXL2" it shows that the MXL2 is a motorcycle unit. Any particular reason why you went with this unit?
So here is my silly question from the back row; when I googled "AIM MXL2" it shows that the MXL2 is a motorcycle unit. Any particular reason why you went with this unit?
Hmmm - Not sure, one of it's claims to fame is its use from the factory in Radical's... They have been around for a long time. As an answer to your question, I like the way it is configured, it's kind of old school, comparatively speaking to the newer displays and has the functionality I need. If in the next phase of the build I end up going with an Aim PDM, I will probably end up with the display they sell with it, but I really like my MXL2 and on the face of it, don't NEED something newer vintage.
Today's progress was getting the relay and fuse boxes in their homes and completing the cabin harness routing, short just a couple items I'm waiting on to keep the big connectors from moving around too much, it's where it's going to be. Both the relay and fuse boxes were able to be re-mounted in the factory locations using the factory stuff so that was nice but man, wrangling those things around is a pain, the wire bundles are so thick, they only want to be where they are.
The fact its starting to look like a car again, on the inside at least is good motivation, having a mess of wires everywhere and the fuse and relay boxes just hanging out was UGLY.
Also, pulled the E88's off so I can get the tires off and rebuild the front's. Put my 2nd wheels on, I know nothing about them really other than I don't think they are going to clear the front brakes and the ride height looks even more absurd with the short front Hoosier that's mounted.
Can't wait to see how it comes out once I can shake the excess off, right now looks hawt fooking fire. Need 24 hours before I can see the final result..
05-28-2022, 05:22 PM
