im in the process of repairing my electrical in my formula the engine harness is a tbi and its all chopped up and messed up. all the passenger wires are gone. the connector for the power steering is gone(is that needed) i have the connector for the windshield wiper box on firewall and have the three wires from the driverside connector but the purple wire is missing. i have the ignition wire as well. is my harness repairable as is? the wires under the dash are all there except the connectors for the ecm that comes from the driverside they are tapped up. im not sure what they are needed for. the vss box is there too. i dont care if the tach water volt and oil pressure gauge dont work anymore im worred about the fuel and speedometer working. will they still work? some one PLEASE help me. i love my formula i have alot of sentimental value in her.

i know theres alot of you guys out there that work on these 3rd gens and i know for a fact that with all of your knowledge you can help me fix my car and hopefully ill be able to hear my 500$ stainless magnaflow dual exhaust rumble.

also if it matters about the engine and transmission. its a 305 tbi with a 5 speed manual. i want to keep my engine and get it bored two a 327 yes i know a 350 is better and cost the same but i dont mean to sound rude but this is my car and i want her the way i like it. i have my "power car"

 

Fair enough

A harness like that sounds like the PO did a carb conversion and somehow you got the TBI unit working again as an afterthought. Im sure the ECM is flipping out, but you just dont know of its plight because the MIL wire is severed

Anyways, you can fix the harness, but with that many hacks, Id just find a replacement from a JY in better shape. Either way, you'll have to pull the harness to do all the repairs. No way you can feasibly test all of the circuits with it installed. If the dash harness is decent, just missing the C207, then just replace that one connector pair

Also, your various gauge functions are simple to get working, probably the easiest to fix of any of the issues you described as most are 1 wire to the sender

This is why I believe there should be a licensing process for obtaining wire snippers

 

No offense - but you cannot make a 327 out of a 305. 327 had 4 inch bore, 305 has smaller bore, and cannot be bored out to 4 inches without destroying the block. If you want a 327, buy one. But then, we're back to the 'might as well buy a 350' since it would be cheaper and easier to find. Externally, no one can tell what you have as long as it's a SBC V8 - they are all identical externally - get a 350 and call it a 283, 302, 305, 307, 327, 350, or 383 and no one will ever know.

Wiring diags might help you: http://www.austinthirdgen.org/index.php?pid=19

At the bottom of page, there is alot of diags for a 1992 car - most will be 98% correct with your 1988 car.

 

one day this week when i get the time im going to a junkyard to pull a wiring harness from a firebird or trans am. if i pull both the dash harness and the engine harness does it matter if its from an auto car or a manual car? i seen some other posts where they said make sure its from a car with the same transmission as the one its going to be put in but im not sure if this is true or not.

i will not be using the 305 idea im gonna try to get a junkyard roller cam 350 or get a new one from summit racing whatever one costs less

 

Find another 88 TBI harness, dont bother with the dash harness swap. Its quite a handful to change

Trans type difference will mean you either have nothing to change or will be repinning the C100 with the pigtail from your old harness

 

ok great thanks for the help. ill see what i can do about a harness this week hopefully the junkyard will have what i need then ill get back to you if i have any luck or run into any problems