Complete Wiring Harness

LoveX1/9s

LoveX1/9s

True Classic
It’s time to bite the bullet and replace my complete electrical system. Anyone know where I can get a new one for a 1985 Bertone X 1/9, 1500cc with fuel injection and air conditioning?
 
LoveX1/9s said:
Thanks Brayden,

Midwest is great and I think the one they are selling is used.
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Yes it is used, to the best of my knowledge no one is making new harness's for any year of X1/9. If you want a "brand new" wiring harness you're gonna have to start with a generic kit or roll your own.
 
I've rebuilt a stock X harness. Repair, replace, modify, add, subtract, etc, as needed. I'll never do that again. Turned out to be more work than building a new one from scratch.

For something completely new I'd start with a generic kit, like the hot rod builders use. Then modify it as needed.
 
LoveX1/9s said:
It’s time to bite the bullet and replace my complete electrical system. Anyone know where I can get a new one for a 1985 Bertone X 1/9, 1500cc with fuel injection and air conditioning?
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What are you trying to fix? The FI harness is a separate item vs the main harness, just FYI.
 
Hi Karl,
The car has ground issues and I took off various grounds that didn't work anyway. I've since scaled it back and thought I should rewire the engine. In short, the wiring is from 1985 and it could use some help. I broke off one side of the connector to my thermo time switch. I put a close enough connector in it from advanced auto. That got me home but now, it’s acting like no fuel is flowing. The covering further up the harness is frail.

In any case, I’ll start with the wiring behind the spare tire and see how it goes. I’m not sure if that harness ties into the main harness but if it does, my guess it will be under the carpet somewhere.
 
LoveX1/9s said:
Hi Karl,
The car has ground issues and I took off various grounds that didn't work anyway. I've since scaled it back and thought I should rewire the engine. In short, the wiring is from 1985 and it could use some help. I broke off one side of the connector to my thermo time switch. I put a close enough connector in it from advanced auto. That got me home but now, it’s acting like no fuel is flowing. The covering further up the harness is frail.

In any case, I’ll start with the wiring behind the spare tire and see how it goes. I’m not sure if that harness ties into the main harness but if it does, my guess it will be under the carpet somewhere.
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OK so those are things which can be repaired and not needing to be replaced as an assembly. I own two Fiats built in the 1960s which have completely original wiring systems (I did make some modifications and did have to rewrap some sections in new tape.) One of my X’s is an 85, the other an 87, although the electrical system of both of them are not perfect they are both reliable and don’t need replacement. They have needed some repair and fixing the changes the PO did to them.

Anytime I see those plastic covered crimp connectors I cringe. The reason is it is very difficult to get a proper crimped connection using these so reliability will be iffy at best. They also don’t fit into standard plastic connection sockets which are intended to keep the wires together and protect the connector/terminal, so using them means something which was intentional often is bypassed or discarded.

The covering over the wires is just a form of tape which you can replace with modern tapes. Buying name brand tapes from 3M and Tesa will give you the best results. Buy tape intended for automotive, not the stuff you find at Home Depot or Autozone etc, most of those don’t use an appropriate adhesive for the temps cars experience, they are just cheap. Recovering a part of the loom is best done by removing the connections from the engine, component etc, removing the old tape, washing with dish soap to get rid of grime, inspect, repair wires or terminals, clean existing terminals and then rewrap.

Like all thing automotive, the electrical system requires maintenance and repair. The maintenance on an old car involves going around and taking a connector apart or a ground bloom off and cleaning the various parts (the bloom, the stud it is mounted to and the wired ground connections), repairing wires which have damage at the connection by crimping on a similar connector and applying a protectant like dielectric grease to ward off future corrosion. There are whole threads on here and other sites which cover removing corrosion from electrical connectors, a subject which gets extreme and likely more than a little geeky/obsessive. A suggestion to you is to not buy the ‘standard’ electrical connector parts at Autozone/Napa etc.

Fiats only use a few different connector types and you can buy high quality examples of those to crimp on if the connector is damaged or the wire is broken. Yes you will have to buy a tool to do this (good ones can be had on Amazon or similar for not a lot of money), it will make your life much easier and make your car more reliable. Have a look at Hussien’s (Lookforjoe) many threads on his cars to see some of what he does to improve, extend and repair his electrical systems. An easy to digest place you can order connectors from where you don’t need to be an electrical geek is Cycle Terminal ( http://www.cycleterminal.com/ ). They have most of what you would need. Choose the ‘tinned’ ones over the bare brass, tinning doesn’t corrode very quickly to avoid increased resistance in the connection. Order some extra pieces to practice on and then go to work. Although all of this is intimidating, it is within any garage mechanic’s ability to do. Take your time, understand what you are doing and you will be fine.

Do you have the wiring diagram for your car? This one isn’t the best quality but it is serviceable. Print it out and use it to understand what you are working on. There really isn’t any magic going on here, there is complexity for sure but by and large as long as the right wire is in the right place it will all work (famous last words).

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LoveX1/9s said:
Hi Karl,
The car has ground issues and I took off various grounds that didn't work anyway. I've since scaled it back and thought I should rewire the engine. In short, the wiring is from 1985 and it could use some help. I broke off one side of the connector to my thermo time switch. I put a close enough connector in it from advanced auto. That got me home but now, it’s acting like no fuel is flowing. The covering further up the harness is frail.

In any case, I’ll start with the wiring behind the spare tire and see how it goes. I’m not sure if that harness ties into the main harness but if it does, my guess it will be under the carpet somewhere.
Click to expand...
Oh, and under no circumstances start just cutting wires out of the car or pulling stuff off without taking pictures and labeling with painters tape and a sharpie what each wire was attached to (picture of the wire on the component, picture of the connector after taking it off and a pic of the label with the wire/connector near the component) so that when you go to put stuff back you don’t have to rely on your memory.
 
Thanks for all the help Karl, and a shout out to every on this site. I bounce between what the hell do I think I am doing to bring it on. But I love my car and refuse to give up. So, I am on the prowl for a thermo-time switch like the rest of the world. If that fixes my problem, I will have the fuel injection harness reworked or made new. I may even give it a go myself since the guy I found charges $110.00/hr. Stay tuned no pun intended.
 
kmead said:
Oh, and under no circumstances start just cutting wires out of the car or pulling stuff off without taking pictures and labeling with painters tape and a sharpie what each wire was attached to (picture of the wire on the component, picture of the connector after taking it off and a pic of the label with the wire/connector near the component) so that when you go to put stuff back you don’t have to rely on your memory.
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"Don't tug on that, you never know what it might be attached to..."

:40 mark

 
LoveX1/9s said:
Thanks for all the help Karl, and a shout out to every on this site. I bounce between what the hell do I think I am doing to bring it on. But I love my car and refuse to give up. So, I am on the prowl for a thermo-time switch like the rest of the world. If that fixes my problem, I will have the fuel injection harness reworked or made new. I may even give it a go myself since the guy I found charges $110.00/hr. Stay tuned no pun intended.
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As others have said the fuel injection harness is effectively stand alone/additive so it can be replaced as an assembly. At this point all of them are likely used but some are more ‘used’ than others due to the environment the car lived in.

@carl had one from the car he summarily removed from his most recent X, I don’t know if he has it still or if he wants to break up the ‘set’.

I would personally doubt that the harness you have is so damaged you can’t fix the minor problems it has unless you have other info on what ails it/problems you are facing.
 
You’re right. Maybe I should check it out myself. Perhaps I could get away with splicing in new connectors. I noticed that a lot of the sensors have the wires exposed. And when I spliced one in that snapped off, the wires in the harness for the Thermo time switch lost their insulation simply by moving the connector around.
 
LoveX1/9s said:
You’re right. Maybe I should check it out myself. Perhaps I could get away with splicing in new connectors. I noticed that a lot of the sensors have the wires exposed. And when I spliced one in that snapped off, the wires in the harness for the Thermo time switch lost their insulation simply by moving the connector around.
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To your point failing insulation on the wires is problematic. However you can go back to where the wire and its insulation are in good condition and splice in, the question is the connection good and the resistance isn’t increased. Replacing the wire entirely back to the next connector or the ECU connector is an option, the terminals for that are available just a little more fussy.

Inspecting and verifying is of course the process. Tedious but necessary.
 
lidox19 said:
Only for 72-82 but new harnesses are available. Found this a few years ago. No idea what the quality is like.

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Interesting find. ;)

I got a little giggle from this part of the listing: "All our wiring harnesses are handmade at our dedicated manufacturing facilities in the East Midlands, ensuring that Classic British Quality which is admired around the world." Let's be honest, electrical component quality isn't generally considered great for British cars. :p
 
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