The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay 53 Wiring Problem

I need everybody to stop what you're doing so you can help me with a problem. OK, so i'm begging. I recently rewired a 1953 Chevy 5 window and tried to make the conversion to 12 volts. I've read all the posts on that conversion but I still have a problem. I traced all the wiring following the schematic for 1949-1952 and thought i had it down. When I turned the ignition switch, the electrical tape wrapped around the hot wires to the ammeter started to melt. The ammeter had a broken lead so I replaced the entire cluster with a 12 volt one and I need to try to start this tomorrow. Any advice on what my problem could be? Am i forgetting a ground somewhere? According to my wiring diagram the only grounds lead from the battery and the starter/coil. There are no grounds running from any under dash sources. I have to do this tomorrow before catching a flight to Alaska.

When wires melt, you have a ground (read short circuit) that you shouldn't have. And since it happens when you turn on the ignition, it sounds like the short circuit is somewhere in the ignition circuit. What wires melt/burn/smoke between the +ve terminal of your battery and the short circuit will be partly determined by the gauges of the wire in the circuit. The stock 6v wiring should be more than adequate because current requirements were higher with 6v.

Save yourself some time having to pull melted wires out of the loom by installing a fusiable link on the main feed wire coming from the start up to the ammeter. You place a solderless connector on one end of the fusiable link where it attaches to the starter and then a crimp barrel connector on the other end of the fusiable link where it attaches to the main feed wire going to the ammeter. If their is a problem again, the fusiable link melts and not all your wiring. The fusibale link wire is 2 wires size smaller then the wire your trying to protect. I would think a 12 or 14 gauge fusiable link is what your looking for.

I've read about your wiring problem and I am having similar trouble. Here's what's going on: I own a bone stock 49 chevy 3100 with 6 volt system and want to keep that way. The fuel gauge used to flutter back & forth but you could see where you were at with fuel. The truck has an 8 volt tractor battery and will not start with a 6 volt battery and I don't know why. Also, when I refaced the guages and reinstalled them the fuel gauge wire to ignition burned up and I mean burned up! I'm rewiring the truck but am afraid to use the 8 volt battery for fear of the same thing happening. I have bought a resistor for the fuel gauge, but I need to know where the short is coming from. Before I started the rewire,I rigged a jumper to the fuel gauge (I think to the empty side) and grounded it to the dash. The whole cluster was out of the dash when I did this and it seemed to solve the problem, but when I reinstalled the gauge cluster the fuel wires burned again. What am I doing wrong? Thank you in advance for any help and apologize if I monopolized the post. Frank

OK, i've fixed my problem. I had to completely retrace all the wires in the harness to find that I had crossed the wires leading to the ammeter and the ignition. Problem solved. Thanks e-one for your help.
As for your fuel gauge problem. Try this...the original Chevy wiring schematics do not show a ground between the fuel tank sending unit and the cab but the GMC one does. I had the same problem with mine until I connected a ground from one of the mounting screws to the cab. You also have to make sure the wires are connected properly at the gauge. If you cross them the gauge will never work. The hot wire from the ignition goes on the left post (as your looking at the face) and the wire from the sending unit goes on the right post. I'm not an expert but I just spent two days looking at the schematics.