everytime i go out and try to tackel the wiring i just crack a beer and start drinkin. im not looking forward to this at all. i was wondering if anyone had any diagrams of what i can cut out of the harness and what i need to splice, add, ect..

basicly i need to keep all lights, gauges, stereo, power windows, power locks, and thats about it.
i want to get rid of everything else. i dont need the air bag crap, the heating/ac stuff, or anything that was controled by the computer.

any help is appreciated seeing how im kinda lost at what to do.
-thanks, jeff

 

Do a search but all the lights and crap are from the harness on the drivers side, by the master cylinder. Basically you can just take the ecm out and all those wires from the passenger side. Only catch is the speedo. I just did the swap myself and can't figure out how to get mine working. Just unplug everything comming from the passenger side, and see what works and what doesn't. It should start right up and run like a champ

 

well, ive searched and came up empty handed quite a few times... but i will continue to try. i kinda am thinking the only way to do it will be just hook everything up and see what works, and what doesnt work. but i was wishing that i could be one step ahead of it.!

 

Before removing anything from the TBI, label what it is as best you can tell. You will need the power & tach wires that go to the coil, temp gage sensor, oil pressure sender, alternator wiring. You won't be disturbing the rest of the stuff just doing a swap to carb.

Most likely, your carb will have an electric choke, so you need to find a wire other than the ignition power that has 12 volts when the ignition is on and zero when it is off. You may have to run a wire from inside the car in order to do this (fuse box).

 

labeling is a good idea, ive started that. i bought the haynes manual for the car, and have been following those diagrams the best i can.

my concern was about the gauges, and if they ran thu the computer or not?! i want to make sure i can get them all to work.

and a wire for a electric choke isnt nessacarry. my ProForm 800cfm doesnt have one!

 

The gages don't run through the computer.

 

If you PM MrDude_1 he had a bunch of detailed wire diagrams for our cars. It has been helping me out.

Pull out the harness from the ECM side, sort it from the rest. Once you have a good 5 ft of what goes to the computer, cut it.

Anything red is power and anything black is a ground, of course. Take your battery with a set of jumper cables, hook up a ground and then take the start harness and the d-block and hook up the main power wires. Now go through with a test light and what has power and what doesn't, sort those out. This is where I am at. Pretty much after that you will need to put the engine in and start hooking stuff up and see what you need and what you don't need and testing what works and doesn't.

Like I said, I'm to this point so far. I am all ears for any other suggestions that may make this easier.

Oh, and the distributor is very important, label that one for sure. Most of the plugs on the engine you won't use.

 

anyone else wanna add some input?

 

Black is NOT always ground. i.e. Check the wiper/wash circuits...

 

Honestly do a search. I'm not saying that cause I'm a jerk, but every week this question is asked. A lot of smart people have responded. Basically find out as much as you can, try it out, then if you run into a problem come back and ask about it. You should have VERY few if any problems.

 

Not sure if this will be an issue or not but wanted to throw it out there just incase. VATS. When I did my swap I forgot about that little thing.

 

yeah... about that, if i just take out the modual box thingy, then it shouldnt be a problem?

 

The problem I had with it was the Starter Enable Relay. Taking the ECM out of the car was cake. The starter enable relay is located some-where under the dash though and I couldn't find the thing : / Ended up running a hotwire from the starter until I have more time.

The fix (assuming you locate the relay) is simple. Splice the larger 2 wires together, they should be yellow and green in color and in pins "A" and "E".

Other than that, the main wires I was concerned with coming out of the bulkhead on the fire wall was the pink wire for the distributor. And the two fusible links attached to the starter solenoid. That's where the power for the fuse box gets it's power. Not to say I'm not worried about gauges, it's just I ran new autometer electrical gauges.

If it were not for Trickster I would not have any of the information above, big shout out for him! He posted the pic below for me too. It is the starter enable relay.

Good luck!

 

Thats interesting because I had no problems at all I actually just hooked everything up the best I could, and everything worked. I didn't even use the wire diagrams I had. I changed no connections or anything. Wired the fan to a thremostatic switch, put a switch in my ash tray for the fuel pump, and I was on the road.

 

If your key doesn't have one of those little chips in it then it wasn't something you would have needed to worry about I just noticed the car in his profile said 92, and it was something I had to deal with in mine (also a 92) and just to make sure he had thought about it.

I'm not at all sure as to when they started doing it, I'm glad it wasn't something that came into play for you though, I was kinda bummed when I went to crank the motor and nothing happened!

 

hey i have a 1991 camaro I took the 305 TBI out and put a carb 385 in it. now my gauges do not work. The only thing that i have is water temp and Alt. NO OIL , TACH, SPEEDO, FUEL. We did not take the computer out and we are useing the stock fuel pump intank. the check engine light will flash and the gauges seem like they want to pop up but they don't. PLEASE HELP!!!

 

Im at the same point all my gauges would have work but I went to aftermarket or the oil pressure and water temp. I still use the gas,tach,speedo,volts.I have seversl other wires Im tracing like the purple from the o2 I m gonna cut. IK just want the dang check engine light out.