Rewiring completed (mostly)....
I drove my '72 Elan Sprint for the longest (only?) trip of it's life with me back in early June, to the British car show in Carthage, MO, USA. Took home "Best of Show" (they don't get many (any) Elan's there - everybody's heard of the Elan, a lot had never seen one). Anyway, the trip showed that the mechanicals are mostly sorted, now for the electricals.
I had them mostly working, of course, and by 'mostly' I mean all the legally required stuff, and whatever was necessary for motivation. But there were a lot of little problems.
My goals for the project:
- Fix all the indicator and warning lights - most didn't work.
- Fix the courtesy light.
- Install a manual override switch for the radiator fan.
- Convert the tach to voltage sensing
- Get the speedo calibrated
- Fuse everything that could reasonably be fused, and reduce the fuse 'sharing'
- Replace burnt wires, remove redundant wiring
- Wire in a new JVC media player
- Make it easier to remove the dash in the future
It took me a couple of months, working in a mostly 100 deg F garage in an Oklahoma summer, but it's done and I'll be taking it on a trip to another Brit car show this weekend. Some hilights:
- I used several Mate-N-Lok connectors in the harness, to simplify future removal
- I welded on the nuts to the lower steering column support to simplify removal/installation
- I rewrapped the harness in the bay and dash, using black non-adhesive wrap similar if not identical to stock in the bay, and a modern 'cloth-like' wrap for the dash.
- I added a six-port ATM fuse box. I now have separate fuses for 1) headlights and horn; 2) radiator fan; 3) tail lights/marker lamps; 4) green and 5) purple circuits; and the 6) accessory key position circuit.
- I rewired my window motors with 14 gauge wires - they now zip up and down. I used to have to help the passenger window up the last couple of inches with my hand.
- I missed perfection by a bit. 1) I neglected to isolate the panel light switch from the headlight switch, so whenever it's on the headlights and marker lamps come on as well. I've got a blocking diode that I'll add to fix that. 2) The parking brake warning light works, or doesn't, intermittently. Not sure what's up with that. I ordered a new one from RDE, which was supposed to be correct for my Sprint, but it doesn't fit. I tried to repair my original, but apparently need to take another run at it. 3) I wanted to add some footwell lamps to augment the courtesy light, but forgot/ran out of time. I'll add them when I fix the panel light problem. 4) I'm getting distortion from the media player when the engine's running. I'm using resistor plugs, so maybe my hi-tension leads are bad. New ones are on the way.
- But other than that, everything works!
While I was add it, I converted to a gear-reduction starter from RDE. I was having trouble starting the car when hot - it ran great once it started, but it would fire once, throw the inertia starter off, and die. It would take several minutes to get it running. I did some searches and found several reports of the problem, but no solution other than go with a more modern starter. Now, with the new starter, you just keep cranking till it's truly running. Problem solved.
- Nifty new fuse block...
- My supply of redundant/unnecessary/burned wire...