Gary Lewis

The blend door works, but are there any other foam joints where air could be leaking out? You've got to remember these trucks were designed in the 1970's and used blow or roto moulded parts with more thought about how to make them fit and be produced on tools available 45 years ago. Smooth flow and velocity were more of an afterthought. There's no doubt that NVH have come a LONG way since then. Right, looking at the ductwork they didn't give much, if any, thought to getting the air to flow smoothly or rapidly. But I assure you that the wiring, connectors, and switches are a huge part of the problem. However, fixing that is a pain - unless there are any of the kits left like Jim installed on his truck. As for there being a diode, I sure don't know where it is. You are right that the drop I'm seeing is about right for that, but since all the wiring now is mine save for the last few inches of the motor's whip I don't think there is one. But I also don't understand where a .8V drop is coming from. Nor did I find that ground. I really just ignored it and provided my own.

Thanks. I soldered the eyelet onto the Y/LG so it can go to the fender as a ground, and the R/O wire to the LG/R wires, plural, meaning the one coming out of C610 and the one coming from the alternator's big plug. And I used a hydraulic crimper to put the eyelets on the Bk/O wire that is the alternator's output as well as the R wire that is the link from the fuse to the starter relay. And all of those joints were covered with adhesive-lined heat shrink. As for the W/Bk wire, it does come off of the big plug on the harness that connects to the alternator. But it ends in a single-terminal connector that shows as C231 on the schematic. Trucks with a stator-powered choke will have a W/Bk wire coming to the alternator with a matching connector.

Would be really nice! Hoping for you that it will work. Thanks, Jeff. Janey and I've talked about it and believe that vinyl seats would be more appropriate for Big Blue than velour. More functional, easy to clean when going offroad and getting dirty, and less "up market". So I'm going to see if he has a blue that would be a close match. Hoping to go Tuesday and take Big Blue to show him what I have and ask that the new ones be similarly comfortable. After all, we sit long hours in them.

Ok, Jim, I think I understand. But do we need to number our splices? Anyway, I'm essentially done. I'll show a couple of pics, but all this needs is a #10-12 eyelet for a 5/16" stud and a "properly sized" fuse. The first pic is of the charge cable I had handy that I'd pulled off another Ford vehicle. The second is of the "almost done" plug & play 3G harness, including a megafuse holder and a link from it to the starter relay. I've assumed that there will be a handy place near the starter relay for the fuse, like where the regulator was. There's plenty of wire to reach that spot, and even a connector to the choke if the truck is using the stator to power it. This should be perfect for a truck with gauges, but we will have to caution people about adding more load in the cab as that #12 yellow wire and/or C610 isn't going to handle much more current. However, that's really no different than with the 1G or 2G alternator as the battery will give them more than 60A of current if they put the load on it. What is different is if they have an aux battery. When the key is turned on the aux battery relay parallels the two batteries and if the aux is dead or low the starting battery will try to bring it up. But that really won't be a lot of current as batteries don't charge batteries all that well. Where the extra current comes from is the alternator, and apparently that #12 wire and C610 is adequate for 60A. But a 3G is a whole different ball game and it would be easy to try to send 100A through there to charge the aux battery. Last, we also need to think about a 3G for a truck w/o gauges, and that turns out to be an easy problem to solve. No C610. In fact, there's no aux battery shown in the EVTM for trucks w/o gauges, so I'm guessing that gauges were required if you ordered an aux battery.

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Not sure what original image you are looking for, but we should have it. Anyway, here's what I've done on the engine-side C610 harness. The first shot is just after cutting off the stuff we won't use, but before moving things so you can sorta tell where they went. And the second shot shows things in progress. The small Y/LG wire has an eyelet on it so it can go under the screw that currently grounds the radio capacitor and holds the regulator on the fender. And the R/O wire and the LG/R wire are twisted together with the rest of the LG/R wire laying there to point out where the LG/R wire from the 3G charge harness will go. And the large Y wire, which turns out to be a #12 instead of a #10, is ready for an eyelet. But I don't have one of those so I'll have to order a #10-12 eyelet for a 5/16" stud, which is what the starter relay has.

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That's interesting. I don't doubt you at all, but I have what I'm sure is an original regulator connector still on the C610 harness I'm playing with and it doesn't have any terminal designations on it that I can find. Just the ID# of D8ZB-14489-AA. Where are your terminal designations?

I can loop them if that helps, but the EVTM doesn't. They just use the black dot for a splice when things join. The reason we had a problem with those two wires was that they are both yellow. Let's try to remember this as we go forward and fine tune the schematic. Like Jim's suggestions of eyelets being called out and the megafuse being moved, we have "opportunities".

Jim - My problem is that I don't have a C610 in its natural habitat to look at so didn't know if the 12" of the large yellow coming out of the connector would be long enough to reach the starter relay, so was using the megafuse as the connection point. But looking at Will's picture, below, it looks like C610 sits right at the starter relay, so it does make sense to go directly from C610 to the starter relay. I'll change the schematic. The connections will be eyelets, but that doesn't usually show on a schematic so I've not put them on there. However, I can see that people need to know that and my plan was for them to see that in the "how to". But maybe in the final version of the schematic they could show there as well. Please remind me when we get to the final documentation. As for S123, do you mean S203? We don't have one of those anymore as we are doing away with everything connected to it such as the shunt, the Y/W wire to the regulator, and R/O headed back to C610 and then on to the ammeter. I plan for my next post to show where I'm cutting, so I hope that will become apparent.

I don't see a regulator connection labeled "S", but the one labeled "I" in the EVTM goes to the "indicator switch". So I could see that one getting labeled "S" by someone, and we've seen these inconsistencies in the documentation before. And there's only one green wire in the schematic going to the regulator, which should be the LG/R wire going to C610. And it would make sense if someone tapped into it to pull in a relay as it is hot in Run.

No, and that's a good question. Is this better?

Missed that. Yes, that's a huge red flag. What else has he "fixed"?

I've re-drawn the schematic for the Done Right solution, as shown below. I've done my best on the wire colors, but it isn't all that good. Anyway, please check it over as I'm about to start creating that harness.

There is a way, but it is expensive. However, it uses the latest of Ford's "maybe this will work" approaches to fuel systems. I went with mid-90's tanks & fuel delivery modules. The FDMs have the switching and check valves built into them so there's no need for external valves, just tees in the supply and return lines. But, the FDMs were designed for EFI so put out too much pressure, so a fuel pressure regulator is needed. And they have a different resistance range for the gauge's sending unit, so a Meter Match is needed to make the gauge read correctly. As said, it is expensive to do a complete conversion, but the beauty is that not only does it work, you can get parts for it that won't break the bank.

Here are the Ford part numbers. I really need to add these and the illustrations starting on Pg 1001 of the MPC to our page at Documentation/Electrical/Speed Control. Perhaps tomorrow watching the Chiefs play. Here's one on ebay for $31.45

Really nice truck. Should fetch the $17K given how things are selling.

Wow! 800 miles? Hope things go really well for you!

Just answered Gary! Will - If I had it to do over again I'd go with an aftermarket fuse and relay panel. These Ford units are not easy to use. But from what both Jim and Scott have said the aftermarket ones are. Jeff - I replied to you. We are on!

Oh, I should have said it also has several fuse positions left that could be used for other accessories. And the factory fuse box is still in use.

I have two fuse boxes, actually Ford power distribution boxes, in Big Blue. The one on the passenger's side has fuses that replaced the fuse links and relays for key-on, headlights, and the HVAC blower. And on the outside it has a megafuse that serves as the fuse for the 3G alternator and a connection point for the alternator's charge cable plus the cable to the fender-mounted starter relay. I have the schematics for that if you want to do it.

I, too, was going to run some tests today but didn't. I have relatively new coolant in Big Blue, but that in Blue is quite old. Better test and see what I can find. And I'll do it with three different DVMs.

Right. The original 2bbl carb had a choke that was run from the stator output of the alternator. That puts a 1/2 wave rectified voltage that should measure about 7 volts on most DVMs. But if they put a relay on they probably were sending full battery voltage to the choke, which wouldn't have worked well. Or, they may have put the relay on if they changed out the carb, as many aftermarket carbs take battery voltage.

Today I got the relays for the HVAC blower done and tested. It made a big difference across all of the speeds, but the biggest change was on High. The difference was night and day, and you can see the whole discussion in the thread called Big Blue's HVAC Blower Issues. However, if you just want to see the voltage differences go to this post. But basically the voltage going to the motor in High is up 50%. And with that done I started the truck and let it warm up to both test the cooling system connections and to see if the system is actually full. That's because I replaced the 180F thermostat with a 195F 'stat and hadn't started the truck since. There were no leaks and when the system is cool, tomorrow morning, I'll top it off. Also, as mentioned elsewhere, yesterday we drove to Dallas with the intention of picking up some blue captain's chairs for Big Blue. But they weren't quite what I was looking for so I didn't buy them. So today I found a guy in Tulsa that does automotive upholstery, so next week I'm going to take the seats Chad/Little Beefy gave me down to him and see what it would cost. And the snippet below is from the 1985 Bronco brochure showing what the seats would have looked like, and that's what I'm to ask him to price.

Yes, that would be an interesting test. But I'm going to leave it where it is as I've gotten a dramatic improvement, even though there's a bit left to be had if someone really wanted to pursue it. That .8v drop is across several connectors, wires, relays, etc. But it could be less if someone really wanted to work on it. However, these #'s are with the new 50A relays, so it isn't likely the drop is across the relays themselves. But it might well be across the relays' connectors since Steve pointed out that they carry a special socket they recommend if you are going to try to put 50A through those relays. And then there are the connectors to the fuse. So right there you are talking about 6 connectors, but then there's the "little" connector to the blower motor itself, which has smaller terminals than the relays or the fuse. So I'm happy with the results I got.