kboehringer

TGO Friends,
We've been struggling with electrical problems since we completed our '82 CFI / LU5 to '86 CCC-Q-Jet /LG4 swap. We replaced our engine bay wiring with a harness and thought we'd be able to swap a wire or two and make the internal harness compatible.....OOOPS NOT HAPPENING...

After spending weeks with an erratic wiring system we decided to stop screwing around and replace the internals from an appropriate LG4. After pulling the original harness and making a comparison to the new harness we've determined that there are more differences than similarities.

Hopefully, the new harness will solve our carb tuning, wipers, instruments, etc. problems...

If you are planning on changing intake systems, and retaining the computer system, you likely need the entire harness.... WE DID!

Sincerely,
Kurt & Derek

five7kid

iTrader: (14)

Now there's a familiar sight...

This is why I repeat over and over again that a complete donor car is so valuable. You seem to have adequate JY resources, though, to take the place of said donor. So often, though, JY cars will have hacked up harnesses because the person taking the alternator/carb/distributor/engine/transmission/speedometer/etc. couldn't care less about destroying something that someone else may be able to use.

I hope this takes care of it for you.

Klortho

Wow, that looks soo much different than my '86 did under the dash. All the extra bracing and different mounting points. Here's a pic of the GTA's behind dash, looks totally different.

Kurt if you want, I have a couple of JY's up here that have about 10-15 F-bodies which I can see if the dash harness is in them....what am I saying, I know they are still in them and snag you a good one if you want.

kboehringer

five7kid,
EXACTLY! We were able to find a harness last Sunday. The wife and I ran over the the J.Yard and found an LG4. The steering column had been removed and the wires clipped at the start terminal block. It would have taken the guy two seconds to unclip it but the BONEHEAD had to clip the wires. Initially, I passed on that one but we returned and decided I could easily repair that "relatively" minor damage. I was afraid that finding a LG4 with a pristine harness was more than a bit unlikely..... Besides, that particular J.Yard only charged $12 for the harness. Aside from some modifications to the radio/speaker area, the remainder of the harness was perfect and untouched. As a side benefit we can now use a more modern/less complicated cruise control system.

Derek has been back to school for two weeks and he is keeping up his end of the bargain with a minimum of 2-hours of school work each evening...... He really doesn't want to loose the Z-28 because of bad grades....

Therefore, "I've" spent the last two days soldering and heatshrinking the repairs and Nancy and I installed the dash this evening. Should be ready for us to hook the battery back up tomorrow.

I would love to have/had a donor car but our town would have issued a HEFTY citation for a non-licensed "DONOR" vehicle faster than you could imagine.

I think this will do the trick... This Z-28 will never be a daily driver, but it would be nice to be able to count on it as a reliable "SPARE" if/when needed.

Klortho & Sellmanb,
Thanks for the offer... We REALLY appreciate it.... But we were able to find one.... Thanks again!

Sincerely,
Kurt & Derek (& Nancy) LOL

five7kid

iTrader: (14)

Going from V6 to V8, I made the decision early to go with the '86 V8 dash harness. What I decided after getting everything detached from the dash was that I could have just unhooked the connectors and moved the entire dash over (which was also my plan, anyway). Oh, well.

I did find the dash to rear chassis connectors, and # of wires, changed from '82 to '86. That took awhile to figure out, because the '86 had been totally smashed in the rear, and I couldn't trace down wires to the rear. The Haynes wiring diagrams were great for the '82, but not there for the '86. I tracked down diagrams on microfiche at the library, but they weren't entirely accurate. After going through blinking back-up lights and orange stop lights, I finally figured it all out.

kboehringer

Five7Kid,

I've also found those differences. In addition, one wierd item was that the '82 chassis harness had solid wire vs. stranded. Hopefully, we have mapped those wires correctly. There is only about eight of them on the '82 (left, right, reverse, running lamps, fuel guage, fuel pump {not needed}, parking brake {'86 now comes from under radio area}, hatch release?)

Fingers crossed!
Kurt

Project: 85 2.8 bird

Good luck w/this. I'm going from 85 MPFI chassis wiring to 84 carb'd engine & dash harness w/87 engine. Beleive it or not, not every chassis to dash connector hooks up , but as long as it runs (w/either mallory afpr or maybe even reduced voltage to fp) I'll be happy.

kboehringer

TGO Guys,

We got her up and running and I never thought I would be happy about a check engine lamp but we are happy about it. Atleast it tells us something is being monitored. We checked the dwell reading and we get some flucuation but a relatively constant 30 on the V-6 scale which the Chilton's claims is about right. I believe we may have let the car idle too long and the reading dropped down to about 5 and stayed there. The Chiltons' claims this could be caused by excessive idling that allowed the O2 sensor to cool down. We'll do a thorough check of all Carb functions on the weekend. But I believe we are on the correct path. The oil pressure guage works, the brake lamp (parking) works, and we got extremely lucky as our first shot was perfect on the tail lamps (reverse, turn, brake, running lamps etc.) The fuel guage is also working correctly.

Only problems are: 1) the "SECURITY" lamp is currently illuminated. We don't know what the heck to do about that or what is supposed to getting monitored. Chilton's has no info on it. & 2) Windshield wipers still do not operate properly we're gonna try another J.Yard wiper/washer combo..... maybe we got a bad one.

Sincerely,
Kurt

Lo-tec

That is correct. The one wire sensor will cool down in your headers after idling for a while and go back into open loop. I wouldn't worry about it. If it becomes an issue it is easy to switch to a heated sensor.

You can always pull the bulb on the security lamp. I thought those were only in the VATS cars.

Project: 85 2.8 bird

is there voltage going to the wipers?

kboehringer

Yes.
They work at high speed on low.
Bounce in & out of "Park" on High (basically move to park and up 4" then back continuously).
Do nothing on Intermittent.
When you turn them off they stop wherever they are.
Washer worked for a couple shots a week or so ago and hasn't worked since.

We replaced the control arm/turn signal with no improvement.

Kurt

Klortho

Kurt, there is a difference in the wiper motors with intermittant and without, I found this out looking for one for the GTA which Autozone and O'Reilly's shows two different part numbers on them. It has something to do with the circuit that is inside of the motor itself. You might be grabbing the non-intermittant wiper motors at the JY's. Just a thought though.

Lo-tec

Was this a delay setup wiper motor? If you have a spare you might want to try swapping the circuit board under the cover. Sometimes that goes bad, or the park switch (which might be the problem since they don't park).

Is it the mechanical or electric style pump? There should be a check valve inline to the washer jar to keep fluid in the line from draining back. You can squeeze the line a little to help it prime while squirting. Also, sometimes the electric ones will drop off the clip that locks them in, or the clip will be broken and make intermittent contact with the terminals.

As far as the switch, it's a pulse/pivot switch that is inside the steering column. The lever just snaps into it and does the switching to different settings.

kboehringer

We sure thought it was a delay wiper. I am not sure if the pump is mechanical or electric. It is on the motor assy. The OLD style wiper assy. was definately a mechanical but that was with the original '82 harness.

We don't have a spare but we should be able to find another one at the J.Yard on Sunday. (Going Tubing on Saturday)

We pulled the entire unit out of the column and replaced it. You're correct the handle only contains wires for the cruise functions. We can also use another new one by plugging it in under the column and it makes no difference either. I think we've disqualified the switch.

Sincerely,
Kurt

kboehringer

TGO Guys,

Made some more good progress this weekend. Derek went to Scout Leader's Camp so I was stuck with the Z-28 alone....

I tore into the engine compartment harness removed much of the plastic coverings and found our biggest problem.......A line that looked TAN to me was actually ORANGE under the wrappers. I had placed it on ground when it actually needed BATTERY POWER! It was the primary voltage line for the ECM.

All of the sudden the MCS is clicking like heck and the Throttle Solenoid is pushing up the linkage.... The check engine lamp is out and the only code I can get is "12" meaning nothing since the A-B terminals were jumped this is apparently normal!!

Took her over to the Pumps to fill 'er up and although I KNOW it's still tooooooo rich ran BETTER THAN EVER. Actually, laid out a few dozen feet of rubber at EVERY corner!! Holly Cow BatMan this son of a gun can MOVE!!

There is not even ONE wire unaccounted for ANYWHERE on this vehicle!! The wipers still don't work properly (I have not been able to find an undamaged replacement at the J.Yards) but EVEN the 1986 Cruise Control works PERFECTLY!!

We're at 95% and thankful for all you help!!!

Sincerely,
Kurt (& Derek)

P.S. The wife says I'm now allowed to buy my own toy ....... Maybe there will be another 3rd Gen in the Drive. Certainly an F-Body regardless of year.