The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay dumb question of the month

Hi, new, ignorent, and dangeruous. just got a 59 apache, body mounted on 83 j10 jeep truck. other than the lights nothing hooked up from one to the other. the bottom half of the sreering colum is 59 the top half is 83, so the ign. and signal is on the 83 witch does work. but the gauges, wiper, blower, not hooked to anything. i need the fuel, temp, wipers, and blower to work.so i can use the truck. the wires from the gauges is cut about 2in. from the gauges. the fuel gauge only has one wire the other is gone, i need to know what side of the gauge goes to the ign. and what side goes to the sender. i have the instument cluster and the fuel sender on my bench. useing my ohm meter both seem to be good. but when i hook 12 volts with gator clips the hand slams to the full mark no matter witch side i hook the battery to. 59 is 12 volt right? the wiper motor is still hooked to the switch but the black wire is hanging, i hooked straight to battery but nothing happend when i turned the switch on. same with the blower the wire hanging i hooked to battery but nothing. any advice, criticism, even insults would be welcome.

Hy TIC, seeing as how nothing seems to work, are there any ground wires running from the cab and fenders to the frame and back to the battery ground terminal?

You would probably get a lot more help if you would try using capital letters, punctuation, complete sentences, and paragraphs. Most of us old geezers don't do text-message shorthand very well and your writing style is nearly impossible to decipher.

It sounds like you have a complete disaster for a wiring system, and most of it needs to be stripped out and rewired one circuit at a time. A hybrid like yours is going to require a LOT of custom work- - - -there's no commercial wiring harness I can think of that would combine the two vehicles into a single system. Get a Jeep wiring diagram for the year and model of the running gear you have, and figure out how to modify the wiring to accommodate your Chevy cab. That project should keep you out of the beer joints for at least the rest of the year.
Jerry

when ever i test a circuit i always bring pos. and neg. straight from batery, i don't rely on what i can't see.

i'm almost an old geezer, grammer is not my strong suit. even though my wife is a 1st grade teacher. i know i have a wireing nightmare, if it was easy i wouldn't need you to tell me how bad i spell. i got a haynes repair manuel for my jeep, witch is just about the most useless manuel i ever seen the scematics are broke up in specific sections, and don't cover half of the cicuits. i got a wireing diagram for 59 truck, none of the wire colors match the 59 harnes under the dash. so back to my origenal problem does anyone know witch side of the fuel gauge gets the hot wire and what side gets the wire from the sender?

I know that fuel gauges and fuel senders must have matching resistance, The '59 gauge takes a 30 ohm sender. No telling what the resistance is on the Jeep sender. The chances of them working together is very low.

Solving that one could be as easy as buying an aftermarket 30 ohm sender for the tank or maybe not.

I would use a voltmeter, turn on the ignition and touch the leads one at a time. Ground the negative lead of your voltmeter, and touch the posts on the back of the gauge. One will read 12 volts. That is your hot lead. The other one is your sender. Does that make sense?

Who could possibly figure out all the mismatch wiring and any other problems on a 59 Chevy to a 83 Jeep?? So many questions to ask like What motor does it have? Jeep, Chevy, Poopmobile? Old senders don't work with modern gauges. Old Gauges don't work with modern senders. Does it run? and drive?, brakes work? Your grammar does not bother me, it's the fact that you actually bought this "truck". ***Rip out all wire and start over. Forget what two vehicles it is and just wire it generically. Dash stuff: Battery to Ignition switch, ignition switch to fuses, thru fuses to switches, thru switches to component and ground components case or it's ground wire to chassis.
Gauges: sender to gauge. Pos terminal on gauge to fuse.(depending on type of gauge)
Lights: battery to light switch (thru some sort of fuse), light switch to lights.
Ignition: "ON" to fuse panel(already said that) and to coil. "START" to starter. You don't have to use the existing connectors or harness routing or wires or fuse panel. Only if convenient. Wire direct when possible and use any connector that you can splice into the new system, just to have serviceability of some circuit or other.

***If something works, wire it last to see if it can be left alone.

Don't quote me on this. But if you don't know anything, this is an overview. Yes 59 is 12V.

there are know wires hooked to the gauges.

Your questions are not dumb. With respect to your truck Sir: I'm sure that there are many hanging wires and miss-wires and ground issues with this kind of Zombie Swap. My advice above, and I think others have said is: Start over. Remove all the previous owners wiring. We all have purchased trucks with PO wiring from hell and we rip it out. You can save the wire if its good stuff and use it to redo if you want to save some money. I have outlined the basic rewire. But you must study up on wiring diagrams and general automotive wiring before jumping in. This is a great group of guys and gals here and maybe someone will go thru every wire with you. But you owe it to yourself to study up, read the advice. You can solve the sender/gauge compatibility with mechanical oil pressure and water temp kits. Amp/Volt gauge should be no problem. Gas gauge could be solved as Cletis said.

I did asked you what exact motor you had. Jeep or ?

You have four good knowledgeable guys helping you and I'm trying to help as well. You will get it done, you are at the right place.
Wire up the ignition to start it up and get it running good, then lights, brake lights and turn signals. Make sure there is oil and water flowing. If you really want to, you can plumb in generic mechanical oil pressure and temp gauges. NO wiring for either. Place them temporarily inside cab or on engine. Be sure there is water in the radiator and the belt is turning the water pump. I'm assuming you are not going to drive it far until it's all done, anyway.
I know several guys here that would like to see how the jeep drivetrain/chassis was installed. (Carl and I) Do the axles/tires stick out past body?

BTW: the fuel sender does not get voltage applied to it, if that's what you said. The gauge does. Be careful how you wire them up on bench. Sender wire to sender post on gauge. 12V pos to pos post on gauge. 12V Neg to gauge case and sender flange. USUALLY!!! Don't know Jeep to Apache.

the wireing is not that bad, its a completely stock j10 straight 6 engine, it starts and runs fine, all the lights work. has power steering and brakes. my problem is getting the gas gauge to work, the gauge is 59 the tank and sender is 59. the only stuff that dont work is the instrument cluster, wiper motor and blower motor. the wireing diagram in the haynes manual is useless, i just need to find the wires from the temp.,amp. the tank was full of rust i took it out, washed it out, put a couple hand fulls nails, nuts, and bolts in it and shook it up real good then washed it again. putting it back in today. the sender and gauge seem to be good useing my ohm meter on the bench. i have know way of knowing witch side of the gauge to hook the sender to and witch side to hook the 12 volts. ive tried it both ways on the bench with a battery and the needle jumps to full either way, and yes i grounded the sender and cluster houseings. this aint my first rodeo, my first woods car was a 1940 chevy when i was 12. ive never been to a mechanic in my life. when i got the truck the clutch was stuck to pressure plate, so i took it all out, turned the flywheel, replaced clutch, pressure plate, and bearing, the front seal was leaking on the tranny so i got a overhaul kit and rebuilt it. i just put it all back in yesterday. also this week i built a th350 tranny to replace the piece of junk 700r in my 89 Z71. that i'll put in next week. i exspect to be driveing the 59 by this weekend, gas gauge or know gas gauge. even the speedo works.

Hy TIC, if you have tried the fuel gauge wiring both ways on the bench and you say the sender is giving you different resistance readings as you move the arm through its range of motion, then I think the gauge unit is defective and only one of the two coils is getting powered up. You probably need a new gauge, hope that helps.

"new, ignorent, and dangeruous." "Not your first rodeo." Two different things. I understand better now. Wiper motor and blower motor's are easy to figure out.
"the wireing is not that bad"
Looks like you are all set to finish her up.

Fuel gauge Sender terminal on left side looking at back.

You have the right attitude, even if you do have grammar problems. I think you are going to make it. Hang in there and good luck.

Best thing to do - as said above is start over with the wiring. Treat the Frankentruck like someone building a hot rod from scratch. You'll need specs and diagrams for both vehicles as a reference, but use one of these kits to get everything hooked up correctly.

/http://www.speedwaymotors.com/Speedway-Universal-20-Circuit-Wiring-Harness,42872.html

Haynes manuals are notoriously crap, but better than nothing. Good news is there are loads of Jeep fans online and I'm betting someone can point you in the right direction for diagrams and specs. The most important specs are going to be resistance values for things like your fuel sender and such. Adding resistors with the appropriate values is easy if you need to add ohms, it's much trickier if you need less. Summit Racing has lots of universal gauges and such for custom builds. I know it's nice to have the original ones work, but I don't know how realistic it is with the setup you have.

Good luck in whatever you decide to do!

i really do appreciate your help, i really am enjoying myself, i love a challenge. but as i said, the wireing is not to bad. all the lights work, stop, turn, head and tail. i hooked the ammeter wires from the jeep to the 59 ammeter, hooked the temp. sender wires from jeep to 59 temp. gauge, both work good. had to redo the clutch/ brake pedal asembly they were mounted way to high, my knees were hitting ears. drove it today for first time, did ok. needs carb rebuilt, thats my next project.