wire loom tape – One Man And His Mustang

It’s been a long time since I have changed anything or added anything to my car. I was at a car show recently and something caught my eye that I decided I wanted to change. That part was under the hood that nobody would really notice to be honest. That part was hood pin and safety catch. There was nothing wrong what so ever with the old ones what so ever. Except that I thought there was just too much blue and it needed to be broken up a little. It’s standard for the safety catch to be car coloured as mine was. The hood pin itself was fine if not a little tarnished after fifty-two years as it was the original parts.

So I had a word with Adam at Mustang Maniac and he said “You need a little stainless steel, with some nice bolts to go with it, not just chrome.”

The safety catch is held in place just by two bolts and like for like swap out. I got a couple of Adam’s new ‘Ford’ branded stainless steel bolts to go with it all. I just love these bolts which looked even better after a good polish up.

before clean

after cleaning

ready for fitting

Undo the two bolts for the safety catch and it will expose the hood pin itself which again is a simple nut to hold it in place.

The swap out is a simple reverse procedure, hood pin and then the safety catch. You have to make sure the hood pin is set correctly, to shallow and the hood will not close, to long and the hood will bounce and vibrate at speed. I created a detailed page on how to change these parts in detail here, or go to the top menu ‘How To.. Projects/Engine Bay/Changing the hood pin and safety catch’

The difference is subtle yet instantly visible if that makes sense, it also matches the hood lip trim.

Before and after side by side. Just another little something to clean now. 😉

On the ’66 Mustangs all models there hazard switch that fitted as standard. The official place for these to be fitted was in the glove box on the upper left hand corner as in this picture I found on the net for the correct location.

Depending if the car hazard switch was fitted later or somebody on the production wanted to fit it somewhere else, it could have been anywhere. The most common alternative was under the dash on the passenger side, sometimes on the drivers side. When I first got my car there was this random switch that I didn’t know what it was for. It was so rusty I couldn’t read anything and it virtually fell to bits when it was touched, not to mention all the wires were cut from it and been melted due to the under dash fire.

I now realise that this random switch was the original position of my factory hazard switch. Now I had a problem as my wiring loom was an American Autowire upgrade kit and wouldn’t work directly with standard hazard switch and pigtail loom. Another conversation at Mustang Maniac and research came up with an accessory kit for the factory hazard switch. Considering the cost of the wire loom in the first place I think it was a bit much to charge for this extra mini loom in my opinion. Anyway, rant over. Adam made a special order for me and the kit came in a couple of weeks later. I popped down to see the guys and also picked up the switch as well.

The wire loom and switch.

The AA kit is a bridge under the steering column that just connects the male to female and the female to male sections for the column (indicators, horn brake switch etc), with the extra wires running from it for the hazard switch. I have created a detailed walkthrough on how to hit it up here, or got to the main menu ‘How To.. Projects/Electrical/American Autowire Hazard switch installation’.

The switch is great quality and just needed to be assembled.

The wire connections for the AA kit was supposed to fit the original hazard pigtail loom, but as I didn’t have (no need for my fitting), I cut the supplied connector off and fitted some heat shrink tubing to each wire, then the spade connectors with a factory look crimp.

correct length

first crimp completed

second crimp

second crimp completed

I then checked the wiring diagram for the correct fitting onto the back of the switch.

I now had a decision to either replace the switch in the ‘correct’ location, or the position that the car had it fitted at the time. I went for the car’s location at the time. Yes there will be the experts that moan it’s not in the correct place, but I have seen a few cars where this was the ‘original’ location. I also understand that some dealers fitted them under the dash to save taking out the glove box liner as it was easier!

Plugged in connectors with heat shrink tube looked pretty cool, even though nobody will ever see it.

Under the dash next to my aircon on the passenger side there are two bolt holes which were used originally, so there was no drilling or measuring for this project either. A case of bolts through the switch bracket, through the dash holes and the backing plate, nuts on the back of the plate and tighten up.

The last part is to connect up the steering column, this is done last as the live power feed is taken from the brake switch, connecting it up first would mean having live or hot wire about as you are connecting up. Not ideal!

under column connected

column sperated

AA Hazard kit in place

The hazard switch now works without the key in the ignition and with the engine on. The old hazard switches worked by putting the switch on and then indicating to trigger the four way flash. To finish the installation, I spend half hour or so wrapping the new loom extension in factory look loom fabric tape, I find it just so therapeutic.

I just hope I never get to use the hazards for a real emergency. I enjoyed my few hours of pottering around on the car, just because I could.

Thanks to Adam at Mustang Maniac (again) who put the special order in for me so I could get this all working.

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Weekend trip to Mustang Maniac was greeted by the cold dark damp air but it didn’t quell my enthusiasm to get there, but I was a little nervous about the task that awaited me again. This weeks update will be a fairly short post as a result of that task, there would be a lot of trial putting bunches of wires here or there and making sure no cross overs or snags, in other words a lot of work with nothing to show for the hard work. It was going to take at all day and then some. Wires are in my dreams now, yellow, red, green, blue, black, white, purple and all colours in between, thick and thin all with type written on the side. I eat spaghetti and I see wires, I look at the gaps in the pavement and I see wires. Trying to make wires look neat is therapeutic and frustrating all at the same time that’s for sure. Reaching up under the dash holding things up made my arms ache like mad. While wrapping all the ugly wires into their respective branches it was at this point is where my second roll of wire loom fabric tape ran out. Yep, that’s two full rolls of twenty-five meters by nineteen millimetres of fabric tape used so far, and it only looks like a few meters have been taped up. I just don’t know where it has gone, it’s not the cost as it’s only a couple of pounds as roll, it just goes nowhere.

The worst part was trying to get the fuse panel mounted onto the dash area. The original long screws were just self thread into the firewall. Yogi when doing the brake lines used one of the holes to hold a bracket up and cover the ugly hole which was a good move. But, on the other hand this meant that I had nowhere to fit the fuse box and some of the lengths of wire they give you aren’t that generous, moving it to another locations wasn’t going to happen. So a change of plan was to use a longer thin diameter nut and bolt through the firewall and into the fuse holder. The only trouble is once I had drilled out the holes to take the bolts they would just push back out the other side as I tried to mount the fuse box up. This is where I could have done with a third hand inside the car, one to hold the bolt, one to hold the fuse box and one to put the nut on the bolt. Not easy but I managed it, not sure how but I did. At one point the air turned a little blue as the colour of my car when the bolt fell out the firewall onto the floor and I had to put it all down and re-bunch the wires back up again. The branches that were in immediate view were wrapped up and cable tied neatly, just for now at least. Yes I do know that this is a gamble as loom should be tested before it all gets put away tidy. So fingers crossed is all I can do for now.

fuse box mounted

bank or relays

The only oversight with this American Autowire loom is a simple one – where do you put the relay boxes. The bank of four relays need to be mounted somewhere and the kit does not give you any idea on how to do that for you. I will have to have a word with the Yogi to see what he thinks and what ideas we can come up with. The rest of the wires were pulled through to the places such as the lights, ignition, dash, wipers radio etc.

Next week I will be hoping to put the new sparkly new switches onto the dash to make the loom live capable as it were. Then it will be more tidying up and putting the wires away.