smittycm

Well I did it! I replaced all of my '66 Coupe's wiring with a brand new 18-circuit kit from Painless Wiring. I debated back and forth between purchasing the 65-66 Mustang specific kit from Painless or saving a lot of money and buying a universal kit. I ended up going with the universal kit for a couple reasons.

#1. It was HALF the cost! (big decision maker right there)
#2. It came with 6 more complete circuits. (18 vs. 12)

The additional circuits allowed me to run wiring for future projects such as power door locks and windows, electric fuel pump, electric fan, etc. I like the thought of knowing I can add these addtional features at a later date without having to splice into a nice new wiring kit. I decided to go the restomod approach a long time ago by the way. I also took the opportunity to replace my stock guages with a new set of Autometer Phantom guages. They came out great! I included some pics below.

I'm extremely happy with the end result. It took a lot of patience and by no means would I consider this a beginners job. Maybe the custom kit specific for the 65-66 Mustang is easier; however, I chose to add some additional disconnects, plus I used mostly weatherpack type terminals vice the basic crimp-on style. It took a solid 6 days to remove all the old wiring, lay the new stuff, and terminate all the connections. I spent an additional solid week studying the original wiring schematic and translating it to the Painless Kit. The work was worth it in the end as I had to spend very little time trouble shooting a small problem with the rear left tail light. Simple fix and other than that the project was a success. Overall I would have liked to have gotten a fuse panel with the "mini-fuses" vice the standard size as the 18 circuit fuse panel is HUGE compared to the stock one. It was a challenge placing it and I ended up having to trash my stock cowl vent (which I planned on doing anyways) and blocking off the remaining hole. You can see it in one of the pics. In the future I plan on doing a cowl repair and completely sealing the cowl opening so there is no chance of any liquid coming through the vent and hitting my fuse panel.

Now my lights are brighter both inside the car and out, I have all the wiring already ran for my planned future projects, I'm not sharing fuses with multiple accessories (everything has it's own circuit), I won't ever short out a constant voltage regulator and lose my guages again (YESSSS!!!!), and I have some additional custom features that I didn't have before (switched trunk light, quick disconnect behind the guages, etc.).

I included just a few pics below. I also plan on doing a complete write-up including my translated wiring diagrams and the schematics I drew up in TurboCAD on my website. I haven't updated my website in a while though so I'll repost once I have it done.

New wiring is the way to go!



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67 evil eleanor

Good job....well worth it.