Rewiring Question

[Empresive]

Hello,

Im not sure were to post this at but i hope this is the right section, I'm just wondering if anyone could help me out on this, I have a Sandrail that im having a friend work on and rewire the whole thing and was wondering what wiring would be best to go with.

I asked him what he preferred, and he told me 7-way wire but having a hard time finding it. I dont know much about wires or anything so i have no clue what to look for, but any help on what wiring would be best to work with would be great.

Thanks,

[shorod]

To completely wire it properly, you're likely going to need a large assortment of multiple wire gauges and preferably colors. You might be best off to get a wire assortment, split loom tubing in assorted sizes, clamps to attach the tubing securely throughout the sandrail, and an assortment of adhesive-lined shrink sleeving. Don't get any solderless crimp connectors since they should not be used where they are exposed to the elements. My suggestion would be to solder all connections, then cover the joints with the adhesive-lined shrink sleeving. A little extra time now, especially when everything is accessible, could save you MANY hours of troubleshooting in the future.

-Rod

[Empresive]

Thanks, that really does help, cause now i have a better idea what to look for and were to for them at. How better would if be to use a wiring harness to use instead of it in like 7-way all in one or somthing like that lol cause im not sure as im still learning.

[shorod]

I'm not familiar with wiring a sandrail, if there is a wiring harness that is built for your particular sandrail application, that may take a lot of the headache out. However, I imagine it's pretty much a custom application, in which case you're probably better off with a custom wiring harness. I'm not really sure what you (or your friend) means by a '7-way' harness.

-Rod

[Empresive]

I'm not familiar with wiring a sandrail, if there is a wiring harness that is built for your particular sandrail application, that may take a lot of the headache out. However, I imagine it's pretty much a custom application, in which case you're probably better off with a custom wiring harness. I'm not really sure what you (or your friend) means by a '7-way' harness.

Im not sure what my friend means by 7-way either, im guessing its like one solid wire with 7 multi wiring inside that are colored red, black, white, blue, green and so on, but cant seem to find out what kind of wiring its called all i come across are somthing called like a 7-way trailer harness but again i have really no clue.

But my sandrail does have a volkswagen engin type though.

Heres a picture of it, which isnt nothing fancy as i had it for over 20 years and always did the paint job with spray paint lol... but for the wiring i guess the guy who is the one doing it for me wants to put in a fuse box so if it shorts out or somthing like that, all the wiring wont get fried and melt as this has happend before. Also the key start, and what ever else there is will need to be rewired, and he told me to pick up somthing like 1 whole long wire with 7 wires inside color coded that he called a 7-way wiring but again i have no clue what wiring that is. So im just trying to figure out what would be the best wiring to use for this.

http://img268.imageshack.us/img268/8281/img00064m.jpg

[curtis73]

There are several companies that manufacture wiring harnesses. They do everything from go-kart harnesses up to factory-replacement EFI retrofit harnesses. Basically what you probably need is a race-type harness. They come with anything from a simple 4-circuit harness with a switch panel up to 20-circuit street/strip harnesses.

Check out http://www.painlesswiring.com/ . They aren't cheap, but they are top notch. Also look at http://www.ezwiring.com/ . They are the same basic thing, only much less expensive. I have used two of EZwiring's harnesses and I have been VERY happy. They have a more limited selection of harnesses, but you get more for your money.

And I don't care if you're wiring a full vehicle or just an LED light on your dashboard, you need a fuse for EVERY SINGLE CIRCUIT. Not using fuses means your project can literally burn to the ground, possibly with you in it. I'll relay this story for you to demonstrate the point. I was taking the alternator off a chevy 454. Not wanting to lose my precious radio presets, I left the battery connected thinking I could just be careful with the 6-gauge monster wire dangling around. The wire fell over, hit my new chrome valve covers where it instantly welded itself on. The battery started belching sulfur dioxide and hydrogen in a violent cloud of explosive gas. The battery produced so much gas so fast that it caused the battery case to explode, spewing acid all over my brand new freshly restored Impala engine bay, the fender, underside of the hood, windshield, and part of my left arm. In the aftermath, the wire had caught fire and miraculously did not ignite the massive volume of hydrogen exiting the battery, but still the acid damage was insane.

Now... contrast that with how it would have been if that wire had a fuse on it. If that wire had a fuse on it, what would have happened is it would have fallen over to the valve cover, given a tiny spark, instantly blown the fuse, and no damage would have been done other than having to replace a 30-cent fuse.

Use fuses... on everything.

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by curtis73

Use fuses... on everything.

I used to own a kit car, that was based on a Triumph Herald.
It used the Triumph wiring loom, and I though the triumph fuse box.
I found out the hardway that who ever built the car had wired around the fuse box when the underside of the dash caught fire on the way to work one morning.
Not a great way to start the day.

[Empresive]

Dang, i see your point that wouldnt be a good thing to have happen to someone. I will keep that in mind for sure, so putting fuses in would be a great idea then. I did have all the wiring of the sandrail all melt right away and as if it was about to blow up as i was driving it. Some idot at the time when my mom owned the sandrail and had a friend rewire the whole thing but didnt do a good job, i was drving my sandrail for some time and it seem to run ok for a few days but as i was drving it started to smell like it was on fire, so i stoped and jumped out and look around to see all the wiring had melted.

Turns out the guy who rewired it had used stereo wiring on it -.-

Now im going to have it done right this time, as i will be doing a lot of the work my self and the guy wants to add a fuse box to it so that would be good. Ill check those sites out and see what i can find, i now got some ideas what i need thanks to Shorod.

Also thanks curtis73 for the links and about always using fuses, i didnt know about what could happen when not using fuses for such a project, but now i do so thanks again on that.