wiring for tach and gauges...

[fordman]

its probably just a loose connection

[layedout72]

nothing is loose though....

the ground is actually tighter than the test ground, and the gauge wires havent been touched.

[rjewkes]

I have had wires thaty i have crimped decide not to work becuase the insulation got sandwitched in beteen the crimp as well.

with guages and lighting if you can you may want to solder them together and use heat shrink tubing to insiulate the solder point.

[layedout72]

Weel, it seems like the parts that i spliced are getting VERY little, if any power. i couldnt tell you if im using the multimeter right or not. but the gauge doesnt work, so im guessing its not getting power. it works straight off the battery though.

I have no clue what im doing, and have no clue if theres another wire I can come off of for accessory power and running power only. I honestly dont care if the gauges need to be mounted in the engine bay, but I would like them inside if possible. I tapped what I thought was the pink wire, but I guess its the red/blue wire coming off the ignition switch, and it worked for a while. Now with the ignition on my wipers won't even work. the red/blue goes to the starter relay... I don't know what to try now. I can;t solder as I have no gun, nor have any idea how to splice a wire outside of the little splice connectors.

[fordman]

unplug the guage off of the back of the instrument cluster and run that wire directly down to your new guage. that is the perfect way to do it. it may have to be running for the volt guage to register properly

[layedout72]

well i thought it was red/blue but after looking at the one on the starter relay, and the one where i tapped into, it looks like its actually a red wire, not red/blue. so its not the relay wire. i dont see if on the 72 diagram either....

[layedout72]

unplug the guage off of the back of the instrument cluster and run that wire directly down to your new guage. that is the perfect way to do it. it may have to be running for the volt guage to register properly

will go look and see what i can figure out. would i do the same with ther oil pressure and crap? I would just need to ground the gauge? the water temp has a new sensor on it i believe...what would i do with that gauge?

[layedout72]

well nothing electrical is working now.

[fordman]

hook them all up the same way just unplug them all one at a time from the origianl guages and run a jumper wire down to the new guages. and then ground them all right where you mount the guages at. that just seems like the quickest easiest way to me.

[layedout72]

i will try that for the gauges, but........all my electrical just stopped. wipers/brake lights everything. dont even have a dome light anymore! why would this happen? i mean.....i didnt change anything from when it did work.....im so tired of this heh.

[fordman]

the battery is dead or has a bad connection or a wire burned up . it could be all the fuses. it could be a fuseable link wire. you will have to start at the battery and work back to the interior.

[layedout72]

all the fuses are fine other than he rigged the instrument panel one with gum wrapper or something. but, it should still let current through, right? i mean, it DID work...flashers and crap.

how do i test the fuseable link wire?

the battery is right under 12 volts.

[390Nut]

all the fuses are fine other than he rigged the instrument panel one with gum wrapper or something. but, it should still let current through, right? i mean, it DID work...flashers and crap.

Never, ever do this. If a fuse blows, and you replace it with a link that CANT blow (the gum wrapper in your example) you can burn stuff up, or worse, catch your truck on fire. Electrical fires aren't easy to put out, especially when the + battery cable is too hot to touch (fire wont go out as long as that wire is connected).

Voice of experience.

[layedout72]

its on the list of things to replace, i didnt do it and done have the fuse to fix it right now. im just trying to get my electical crap back. i have NOTHING right now.

[390Nut]

Check this diagram here:
http://www.fordification.com/images/sch ... _quick.jpg

You should have two resistance wires coming off the ignition, both violet, AND pink. The PINK one is for the ignition switch, but BOTH should be hot-in-run, as should the blue wire off the ignition switch. (use the blue one for hooking up aftermarket goodies like gauges)

Red-blue is for the starter circuit only.

As for using your old wiring to run your new gauges, that may or may not work, specifically for those gauges that use senders (fuel level, electrical oil pressure, electrical water temp, etc). You need to use the specific sender for the specific gauge you are using, because the senders have a specific ohm rating, which is likely to be different in different vehicles, and aftermarket stuff is going to be different still. It likely wont hurt anything to use the wrong sender, but they wont necessarily read correctly.

A "T" is exactly that. It's a 3-way splitter, and in the case of sending units, they are usually a brass fitting made to connect more than one item too, and you can use them to add more than one sender to a location; your oil pressure sender from the filter housing, for example.

Most aftermarket tachs used to have 4 wires, not sure about current ones, but:
Red=power
Black=ground
White=lighting for the tach (hook it up to your dash lights, is the usual way)
Green=coil (- side)

Some of them also had switches on the back, so you could select which style engine you had; 4, 6, or 8 cylinders respecitvely.

You say that now you have no power anywhere. Can you turn the headlights on, or anything? Sounds like you may have fried your ignition switch or burned up a wire (or more than one) in your dash harness (which is what jumping fuse holders can do, and what fuses/fusible links are made for, to burn out and protect the rest of the harness).

Two ways I can think of to test fusible links;

1) disconnect both ends and put one end onto 12 volts (+ side of battery) and run the other end to + side of your volt meter, and ground the volt meter. Check the voltage, if there is very little or none, it's shot.

2) swap that link for a new, known good one.

Time to start tracing wires and look for burned insulation/shorts. Check your fuses again, and check the terminals on them. A little corrosion can go a long way. Check the fusible link at the main junction of the black-yellow wire by the starter solenoid/alternator harness. If all else fails, you could try replacing the ignition switch assembly. Just unplug yours, and plug the harness into a known good one from another truck (preferably a `71 or `72, I believe they use the same switch)