I've got a 89 Camaro RS with a 350 that the previous owner must have put in. The wiring is all messed up and the car wont even turn over. I believe the wiring harness is not stock, and the wiring diagram for the stock car is not correct for this car. I would like to fix it myself, although I am new to working on cars. My dad is a mechanic, but he's always busy working on customer's cars so I was hoping to get my Camaro running on my own. Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

Get a new wiring harness for another 89 someone is parting out.

 

That involves rewiring the car and I'd like to avoid that if at all possible

 

Are you sure your not dealing with a vats issue ?

 

I'm definitely dealing with a wiring issue, the kick panels are taken off and there are several wires that have been cut, and under the hood there are wires that were poorly spliced and/or are no longer connected to whatever they were connected to.

 

You need to start with the starter circuit. Power comes from the ign sw to the park neutral switch to the starter enable relay out to the starter solenoid. The wire colors change but at the enable relay you can connect the large gauge yellow to green and test for power while cranking there.
http://www.austinthirdgen.org/mkport...nE_starter.jpg

 

The only issue is I don't have an accurate wiring diagram because wires have been spliced. The motor in it was swapped in, so it went from a 305 to a 350 (not sure if/how that would affect the wiring) and it seems like the previous owner tried to hook up a push-to-start button, although there is still an ignition, so I think it was switched back halfway through?

 

 

UPDATE: I got my 89 running with a lot of help from my father, the wires from the ignition to the starter needed to be reconnected, but the biggest issue was that once we could start it, it wouldn't stay running. The engine would turn over, start up, and die. After pulling the air filter off and watching the fuel injectors spray, we found that it would get one good spray on startup and then it would stop spraying and die, but spray one last time as it died. Turns out it was a VATS issue, the previous owner replaced the ignition but didn't bypass the VATS system, so now I have one key that turns the car on and starts it, while the old ignition (with the chip key in it) is plugged in to disable the security system. There's still a bunch of wiring that needs to be cleared up to make her look pretty again, but now she runs and boy does she purr.