I've got a 1987 IROC that I'm installing a Holley 12.3" ProDash into. I need some of the inputs to the stock instrument cluster such as the blinkers, headlight high beam and fuel level. Here are some pictures of of the connectors and terminals:


You can see that I've depinned some of the terminals.







These wires are not long enough to reach my connector that plugs into the back of the ProDash. I know that I should just cut off the copper terminals and splice a new piece of wire on. However, the **** in me would rather not cut the OEM terminals off. Are there any metal terminals available that would mate up with the individual copper terminals shown above? If not, I guess I'll just have to cut the copper terminals off.

 

No there are no mating designed Terminals or Connectors...
The Terminals were designed to contact a PCB or Ribbon Cable.

But the aftermarket has had good luck with 3d printed options:



These Images are from a Caspers Electronics and DD-EFI Instructions.

 

Why just those few wires? Does the new dash bypass the rest of the car's wires and plug directly into the new PCM?

This is probably more than you'd want to spend just to extend a few wires. You could remove all of the wires from these adapter harnesses that you won't need and leave the few wires you will need.
Plug-n-Play Dash Harness, Newrad Solutions - Third Generation F-Body Message Boards

 

vortec, are those 3d printed connectors available from Casper's or DD-EFI? I went to both websites but I didn't see anything similar.

Like I said, I'd rather not cut the OEM terminals off but will if I have to.

 

My car is LS427/570 swapped and I've got a Holley Dominator mounted under the driver's seat. The Dominator will communicate most engine parameters with the ProDash via CAN. I'm running essentially the same thing in my LS376/480 swapped, Foxbody coupe in my signature. I absolutely love the ProDash and can't imagine using anything less.

The link that you posted led me to this item:

Digital EZ Harness Professional Installation Kit for GM 14-Pin (short)

It's pretty spendy for what I want to do but it sure would be clean and I wouldn't be hacking up my car. I'm going to seriously consider it. Thank you for the information!

 

I would not cut off the terminals close to the ends. That will make it impossible to ever reuse those terminals to go back to stock.

Better to leave a long wire pigtail to the stock connector by cutting the wires further back in the harness. Then you can just terminate the pigtails with modern connectors so that you can plug-in the original pigtail or plug-in a new Holley pigtail that you make.

Basically, make yourself an adapter pigtail using donor wire from your original harness. And then make another adapter pigtail for the Holley (or whatever else you do in the future).

 

I agree with this. If I do end up cutting off the original, copper terminals I'll be sure to cut them with enough OEM wire to be able to splice them back in some time in the future. I probably won't ever do that but I'd like to have the option to do so.

 

I have never seen these connectors in person, but it looks like you could potentially rig up a spade connector to slide over those ends. Reliability of the connection would be my primary concern with that approach.

 

I was in the same boat w my dash. I cut the terminal off that I was using w 2 inches left on the terminal side. Then I made new harnesses for my dash. I used an 8 and 16 pin deutsch connectors. The cluster comes in and out easily and i have extra wires in the harness for the future.

 

The "short" kit is the same as the "long" kit, just that one kit has longer wires than the other one. When I got it, he only had one kit available, supposedly the "long" kit, which is why my link is for "long" kit. But the bag it came in says "short," which is all I needed anyway, so I don't know which kit I actually have, but I suspect it's "short." Looks like he has both kits available now.

I prepared mine by removing the pins/wires I won't need, like you or anyone else would do. I left 5 wires in one connector, and 9 wires in the other connector.



A lot of parts are included in these kits to account for just about any wiring solution, so for all you get, I think the price is pretty good.

I searched for weeks for something like this because I didn't want to cut wires either, so when I found these, I considered them to be a bargain. I wasn't even sure if they were for real, but with only one kit left, and a price that seemed worth the risk, I blindly jumped on it. Then when I received a shipping notification the next day, I was pretty excited lol.

Without intending to sound glib about money, but when we consider how much we spend and even waste on engines, computer systems, gauges, dashes, and all other types of upgrades we invest in, the $100 range for anything could almost be considered throw-away money. And when it's for a unique, specialty part, like these kits that can protect the integrity of a car's wiring harness, then that price would be money well-spent, IMO.

 

LAFireboyd, I agree with what you said in your last two paragraphs in the post above. I went ahead and ordered the short kit about a week ago and it arrived today. I depinned all the wires that I'm not planning to use and I connected the 3D printed connectors onto the OEM, instrument cluster plug in connectors. Nice and clean with no wire cutting.





The ends of these wires will get Holley specific terminals crimped onto them and then inserted into the ProDash's connector seen just to the right of my thumb.