Going to rewire Brutus!!

[ttypewhite]

Getting the itch to do something different, so I figure with the help of my buddy Jack from Racetronix, we are going to rewire Brutus. There a lot of wires under my hood that drive me nuts, and there are a lot of wires that I don't even need anymore. All wires will be hardwired directly to my FAST system and routed differently then it was from the factory. I want to hide as many of these wires as humanly possible and simplify everything in the process. Let the games begin....

Before

Motor out

Harness out

Harness stripped and on the operating table to be labeled and traced out. Going to get rid of all the stuff that is not needed. The engine harness will be separate from the harness routed under the PowerMaster to the fuse panel on the passenger side. Let the games begin.........

 

[Boost231]

Just had my wiring guy do the same. Have fun and good luck

 

[GNBRETT]

u gonna have a custom harness made?

 

[ttypewhite]

u gonna have a custom harness made?

Yes. It's going to have a multi pin weatherproof connector mounted on the firewall for a quick disconnect behind the intake. And a separate one that is needed to run to the battery. Relays will be all inside the car on the passenger side. The fuse panel stuff running the lights, horn, wipers, starter etc will remain. I will just tidy it up and re loom it.

 

[GNBRETT]

sweet Mike....

 

[ttypewhite]

Warmed up the garage last night and started stripping everything from the passenger side of the car. Never realized just how many wires run on that side. So everything that was taken out was added to my diagram. By trying to clean up the amount of wires that are seen I'm going to have to reroute and lengthen a large majority of what is currently there and run a central harness to anything that needs direct battery power. The only thing I have left to change is the MSD on the back plate. Currently those wires are run across the back of the firewall and into the car. The plan is to drill a hole in the plate with a grommet and run the wires inside that way and have nothing along the back of the engine.

 

[Justin85]

Nice little winter project , I've always hated wires , but it seems that you have a good grip on things here.

 

[ttypewhite]

Had a warm day last week to do some more work on Brutus. I put the engine back in for a wiring mock up.

We opted for a smaller connector for the firewall that holds 32 pins. Now with the engine in place, I can see where I can put this without interfering with other stuff going on behind the intake (mainly my fuel rail and return line). I think I found the spot that will work out well.

 

[ttypewhite]

With the wiring location narrowed down, it's time to move onto the next faze. I want to clean and flow my injectors. So I called my buddy Jack from Racetronix and he said to bring them by. Being lazy, I brought the whole intake..... you want to see what a snowball effect looks like??

After I got my injectors out and cleaned. We looked at the intake and saw that it needs a face lift. So it was stripped down, glass beaded, repainted, oven baked, and dressed. What a night and day difference.

Saw how well the intake came out so we did the fuel rails and painted them semi gloss black. Time to dress it with my injectors and fuel rails.

Didn't like the way it looked with the blue and red AN fittings. So now Racetronix carries a full line of their own engraved Racetronix AN fittings, adjustable fuel pressure regulators and fuel guages.... Yah, I know, kid in a candy store. So I decided to go black with everything using all Racetronix lines, fittings, fuel reg and fuel guage. The end result speaks for itself.

 

[larrym]

Looks awesome like everything else you touch!

 

[Nick Micale]

Last year we re-wired my car after 15 years of abuse, and we installed a new stand-alone XFI harness.

The quick-connect bulkhead connector carries all the wires for the engine which make for a simple removal when needed. All the XFI harness wires and others are in the aircraft connector.

There are NO fuses in this car as all the relays and circuit beakers are on a board easily accessible in the glove compartment.

Only a few wires on the engine going to sensors are visible.

 

[ttypewhite]

That's the plan Nick. Looking to simplify everything going on under the hood while giving it a facelift in the process. We mocked up lengths for the wires to the sensors on a test motor and color coded everything on a build sheet. Next step is to start the assembly of the harness. Can't wait to see it all done.

 

[Nick Micale]

That's the plan Nick. Looking to simplify everything going on under the hood while giving it a facelift in the process. We mocked up lengths for the wires to the sensors on a test motor and color coded everything on a build sheet. Next step is to start the assembly of the harness. Can't wait to see it all done.

Mike, there is no doubt that your workmanship is always awesome, so it will be a piece of art when you are done, good luck and have fun with it!

 

[Danster]

Now Get Racetronix to start making Fuel Rails!!!! They do for other cars why not ours?

Awesome Workmanship!

 

[ttypewhite]

We decided on going another route with the fuel rails setup. Instead of the regulator at the back of the intake, we opted for the drivers side for less fittings and a cleaner look.

It didn't end there......this is where the pocket book opens up. Racetronix has their own quick disconnect fuel fittings ranging from #6 up to #12. Tell me this isn't awesome. This is definitely going on the car.

While I'm at it I'm going to ditch my power steering res and go with this.

Going to totally murder out this engine compartment and ditch all the red and blue Russell fittings and color scheme.

 

[ttypewhite]

Picked up another piece to the puzzle for some stronger spark.

 

[ttypewhite]

Last night we made a custom crankcase solution to replace my PCV with a Racetronix check valve, fittings and teflon #6 line. This is what it looks like off of the intake.

On the intake, it just replaces the PCV in the grommet and is routed under the runners and out the back where it is plumbed back into my intake spacer.

 

[ttypewhite]

This was just supposed to be about putting in a new wiring harness right??? Well......I managed to strip my car to the point were everything seems to bother me. So now this snowball has grown bigger and now I'm trying to re-invent the wheel. It started with me stripping my frame down to bare metal now that my motor was out. No problem, I'll just repaint it and continue on as planned.

Nope.. I ended up yanking out the steering box and getting another one to fix the slop the old one had. Then looked at my passenger side inner fender, and pulled that out because I hated the fact that I carved it up years ago to run a fender dump thru it so my car would sound cool at the track. While I'm at it I will continue to sand everything in the engine compartment......... et voila.

Then drilled out the hole for my new bulk head connector for the wiring harness I was only supposed to do in the first place.

Now that everything is sanded, all wiring removed, and hole for bulk head connector done. I wanted to buy a couple cans of GUNK engine degreaser and completely soak the engine compartment of any oil/grease. So I did that. But it being as cold as it is. I can't see cold water being effective. So I went to Home Depot, got some fittings and ran my garden hose down the basement to my tank less water heater. Turned the temperature up to 180 degrees and ran that into my pressure washer. It did a fantastic job of cleaning everything super clean. Turned on the compressor and blew out the water. Later that night I painted the frame, rad support and firewall. I used a satin black chassis paint with primer in it. These shots were done right after spraying it

These shots were taken the following morning.

 

[czimpel]

Looking good!

 

[larrym]

Man ! Nice work