Wiring or Splice

[Gavin]

I have a 71 ghia and the wiring is generally okay with some exceptions.

Wouldn't mind replacing the fuse box with something of similar size (would like to keep the stock look) but using blade fuses - not everyone stocks those ceramic ones.

Also in the engine compartment some wiring is a little messy.

The wiring itself has never let me down however.

I could pull the loom, untape it, replace the one or two wires that need it, extend it in the middle to compensate for perhaps replacing any terminals that need replacing (maybe I should just replace them all to address any resistance/age problems) and add a couple of others to the loom for guages etc.
So it is more a preventative maintenance thing rather than fixing problems.

Should I re wire or just extend in the middle? Does wiring develop resistance with age and thus seriously justify replacement?
Of course extending the loom maintains the colour coding that is nice.

thanks

[Chris V]

I've been driving VW's for the past seven years now and I don't think I've replaced ten fuses...so get a small stockpile of them and carry them in your glovebox.

I typically repair the brittle old wiring in the engine bay with new wire, or good condition used wire I've gutted out of a parts car (buses are great donors)...I typically run a 16ga speaker wire alongside the existing harness to give myself a tach wire and a spare. Speaker wire also works well for the back-up light harness.

I'm an advocate for keeping the stock wiring code, and also use as many factory crimped wires as I can - which usually means crimping on just one new end, or soldering.

Avoid wire that has corroded to a green/black color...use dielectric grease on future connections to help prevent corrosion.

My $0.02

[Dale M.]

If stock wiring is working ok for you, then keep it and make necessary repairs and go on and enjoy life, if you want to hate yourself for weeks, just start a rewire project....

IF existing wire only needs a little tape and a few new connectors just do it...

Changing out fuse panel is a nightmare, because there is NOTHING that is a easy direct replacement other then a NEW OEM style fuse panel.... I wonder why nobody has developed one with ATC type fuses.....

Avoid BUTT splices when ever possible. They are the worst thing ever..... IF you need to splice I would recommended solder and heat shrink..... IF you do not have soldering skill now might be a good time to learn..... BUT I am not a advocate of soldering terminals on wire ends, still like to just use crimp on terminals....

I don't understand cars that blow fuses, there is no reason for this...... I never have any fuse problems in any of my cars unless I get stupid or clumsy when working on car....

Another thing about automotive wiring.... "If it ain't broken, don't fix it".....

Dale

[raygreenwood]

DO NOT use solder. Solder has no place in vehicle wiring harnesses except on the rigid circuit board end of connections. Soldering is used by not one single OEM in wiring harness and has not been since probably the early 60's for very good reasons...because it is long term unreliable in high vibration , high heat and high humidity no matter how well you heat shrink it or seal it. Just get a decent crimper and use factory style crimps on everything. If you are cutting and extending a harness....like cutting it off at the firewall and rewiring,....you can use factory style T-1 connectors if need be.

Also...there is nothing wrong with butt connectors.....if they are the right type and crimped properly. Those crappy red blue and yellow ones with the split tube inside are definatly not for automotive use. Find solid un-insulated ferrules (usually tin plated copper). Use a real crimper...not one of those crappy single point "staking" type pliers made for the crappy red, blue and yellow terminals. A barrel type crimper used on a but connector makes the identical crimp style to a factory terminal end.....which is effectively hermetically sealed if the right crimping pressure is used. From there you can heat shrink it. Ray

[2088 bob]

Ray gives some very good advice here...... soldering has no place in a vehicle

[raygreenwood]

I must tone down my hatred of the red blue and yellow insulated connectors. They are actually excellent if they are (a) quality build and (b)...if you have the proper pliers made to crimp them...like any other terminal I guess.
For the cost of a good pair of Klein staking pliers.....I got an OEM style crimper and just stuck with OEM terminals. I rant too much. Carry on......Ray

[david58]

I must tone down my hatred of the red blue and yellow insulated connectors. They are actually excellent if they are (a) quality build and (b)...if you have the proper pliers made to crimp them...like any other terminal I guess.
For the cost of a good pair of Klein staking pliers.....I got an OEM style crimper and just stuck with OEM terminals. I rant too much. Carry on......Ray

The problem I see with the devil connectors the red blue and yellow insulated connectors is the split in the connector. I have always wondered why they didn't make them without the split. I have always used them and have found that double crimping 180 degrees from the first crimp usually makes a tight crimp. I wish I could afford the better pliers and connectors, but I don't do enough electrical repair to run out and buy them.
Ray keep on ranting don't stop. A bad connection isn't nothing but trouble.

[Dale M.]

When using "stake" (indenter) pliers (sta-kons) always try to put "stake" opposite the split... They hold better, when you stake on the split it opens up barrel and makes for loose connection....

If I'm going to bury a splice in a harness or in a tube on side of dunebuggy and I can't get ready access to it I will NOT use a butt connector, I will continue to use solder and heat shrink... No matter how good a crimper I have I still don't like butt connectors and this comes from over 40 years of wiring in telecommunications and automotive fields....

Dale

[Chris V]

There's always good and bad, whether it's soldering or crimping. I've never had a solder joint fail, or seen one of my Father's or Grandfather's for that matter...Failed crimping, all the f'n time, crimping has a bad rap to me, because the person who crimps is more likely to be a tool in the first place...Speaking of wiring modifications, I hate Scotchlok's, but use them all the time in my field Never seen one fail outside of a car, which re-enforces the "who" is more important than the what in my mind.

[raygreenwood]

Solder joints will rarely if ever fail....mechanically. However they do fail electrically at a rate that is vastly higher than a "proper" crimped connector. By this I mean that solder is a very poor choice for resistance sensitive components like fuel injection. It may never have an issue with a general chassis harness connection.

A buttconnector is not any different than a barrel connector from factory wiring. In fact...it is a barrel connector. There is a split in all barrel connectors to allow the die to curl the leaves over for a much tighter crimper than you could get with a solid barrel connector. You have open barrel and closed barrel. the closed has no split and takes a different die.

The ONLY problem with common butt connectors.....is when they have that silly vinyl (red,yellow, blue) covering over them. The vinyl covering is 100% what makes butt connectors fail because: (a) even if you had a decent crimper you cannot properly line up the split in the butt connector to the right location in the crimping die (b) because that crappy vinyl does not allow the butt connector to fit properly in any die period (c) because that vinyl covering only allows the use of "stake" or indentor pliers.
Those pliers in themselves are not hideous.....they just have to be used properly and must be of very good quality. Typically most indentor pliers do not have indentor segments wide enough to stake the open barrel. You need good one (Klein, Knipex, maybe Greenlee, Paladin brands).

If you simply would start with uninsulated butt connectors...without that crappy vinyl covering....and use a proper crimper....you get 100% success rate just like any other open or closed factory barrel crimp. The red, yellow and blue connectors in themselves are not poor quality...just the insulating vinyl.
These were created to allow useable connections for home and stationary industrial use.....where expensive dedicated barrel crimpers are not always available. The vinyl on these connectors serves as a basic strain relief to prevent chafing of the wire on the connector edge....in lieu of having a "real" strain relief that is simultaneously crimped by the die. A properly crimped, non insulated butt connector is vastly superior to solder both mechanically and electrically and is equal to any of the factory crimped terminals.

It kills me. People will go out and spend $100 on a Milwaukee or DeWalt drill to make better quality holes with plenty of torque....but they won't spend $100 or less on a proper crimper and dies to make better quality electrical connections. Ray

[Mathias]

Just my 2 cent...

I first buy the cheapo terminals (red blue yellow type), take off the bad isolator, crip it with a good crip-tool, the solders it. last cover it with shrink-tube (can be the worng word, 'cause don't know the english word for it). sounds like a hassle but when I have everything setup i take 30-60 sec per connection. I have done this for aleast 10 yeas and have NO failure so far...

[ntsqd]

When I built the harness for my glass buggy I soldered every terminal. Every last one of them. Even those on the revisions made over the years. The main harness was built over 15 years ago, probably more like 20 years ago. In the time that I owned it (sold it this last Fall) it only ever had one electrical failure. One. The main power wire for the dash controls fatigued at the solder joint and failed just outside of the terminal's barrel. I failed the terminal. I allowed solder to flow up the wire outside of the barrel. Operator error, pure and simple.
Now one sample doesn't prove that soldering is the way to go just as one other sample won't prove that soldering is the devil's spawn when applied to vehicles. It is just a data point.

I have come across OE soldered connections in late models. Exclusively these have been barrel joints of several wires (3+) buried within the loom.

The next loom that I build won't be soldered except in certain situations (like those OE joins).

[Lotrat]

Solder joints will rarely if ever fail....mechanically. However they do fail electrically at a rate that is vastly higher than a "proper" crimped connector. By this I mean that solder is a very poor choice for resistance sensitive components like fuel injection...

I'm not sure I understand. Most sensitive electronic devices have PCBs stuffed with components that are all soldered. I can see vibration breaking the junction between flexible wire and soldered wire, but I can't see the resistance issue here. Manufacturers always look for a faster way to build stuff. A crimped wire harness is faster to build than a soldered one, especially back in the day when it was all hand made. Also, most battery connections are soldered so it's not a 100% rule.

[ntsqd]

I just recalled something about crimping. A friend works in low voltage electrical. He was telling me about some Union electricians that they hired for one job that were used to working under L.A. City codes. Those codes required the "oval" type of crimp for the insulated crimp terminals, but allowed the "indenter" type of crimp on uninsulated terminals. He had to tell them that the "oval" type crimp was not acceptable to his company, no matter whose codes they were working under (job was not in L.A.).

[Ol'fogasaurus]

I'm going back in time now but the old time soldering of the battery cable was largely a plunge type of solder job (we used soldering irons then, a more controlled heat than you get with soldering guns). The receptacle/connector was heated and filled with (just enough) solder and flux then the wire was plunged into it displacing the solder up the wire to (hopefully) the top of the receptacle/connector, then the new assembly was allowed to cool. That way, there was not too much solder and flux in the join nor was there too much heat applied.

It seems to me that the acid/flux could become a conductive issue if too much was used. I know you can get a pretty greasy connection so it is something to think about.

I have never liked the flat woven/braded ground wires (al lot of thin wires woven together like a flat bracelet with flat connectors on the ends) that cars like VW's (body ground to starter), old Fords, GM's and others had. They failed quite quickly and always seemed to come apart. Body or battery movement or a lot of cable disconnects caused them to break apart or fail quite easily. If I found one, I usually changed it out to a cable, when ever possible that is. They may have been OK for positive ground cars, I don’t know but they never seemed to hold up well.

Also, go to a larger cable (smaller number) when at all possible. I prefer (or) when I can get it, to use the lead/cable wires for stick welder, While expensive, they make great battery cables especially when the lead is to be long; such as when the battery is being mounted in the truck as in a rear mounted battery (forward mounted in a VW).

Anyway, for what it is worth.