re-wiring the shell

[UweM3]

My cars wiring loom has already been minimized after the cage was build but I am having more and more trouble with age related failures. Need to wiggle here and there sometimes and wires snap off at the plugs because they are brittle.
Would like to hear from people who either have rewired the car themselves or had somebody doing it for them.

Or will a new wiring loom from the dealer be good enough? Can't imagine they are "fresh" production

[Andye]

Would be interested in replies to this as well, as I've been putting off going through my whole loom for the same reason and it's the next job I need to do before putting the cage and (minimal) trim back in. For the cost of a "new" loom it might out weight the cost of an auto electrician for the day to sort it all out?

[JimmyC]

I made my loom up from 3 other looms, took me about a week of evenings on the dining room table including extending everything to allow the fuse box to the inside of the car.

Fitted and tested, then out again to wrap and then back in!

Pig of a job

[martinpallot]

I re-wired my rally car from scratch starting with nothing but the plugs from the old loom going to things like lights etc. I also dumped the orginal fuse box and have 10 in a kit car style box on the dash. Then use aircraft style switches instead of all the original bmw stuff. All in all i saved about 10 kilos. I also made a few 'sub looms' rather than having evrything in just the 1, so that if a circuit does go wrong, i know exaclty which clump of wires i need to do the fault finding through. However my car runs a digital dash with none of the original intruments whatso-ever which simplified the job drastically in my opinion. Took a weekends work in all. Will be modifying it this winter to rely all the circuits though as i have had one switch fail at an event due to it being subject to all the laod. Deffinately worth it for the piece of mind when at events. Not sure if I'd want to do it on a car which is used on the roads much though as its not the most ergonomic option with regards to the switches and the like. Another good point is that i have my own simple diagram which i drew up whilst i was building the loom and dont have to rely on the complex haynes stuff!

[oldroydsr4]

Im currently doing this at the mo.

I'm using this fuse box

http://www.cbsonline.co.uk/cbs-wiring-m ... 1185-p.asp

+ have 2 looms to use for connectors

With addition to this aircraft style switches will be used and aftermarket dials (not bmw dash)

Ive been putting it off for a while but its time to get involved

http://shark.armchair.mb.ca/~dave/BMW/e30/

^^ ths is a great link for the e30 electrics

[e21Jason]

Hi

I am using this but have yet to install it

http://www.painlessperformance.com/webc ... ield=10102

Jason

[ShepsEvo3]

Uwe, are the looms still available? I guess you are meaning the interior/exterior light looms?

[Ptr]

Uwe.....Why dont you consider having a custom loom made...(As I did with mine), probably not as expensive as you think. TOTAL peice of mind when you switch on & much neater as well. Can give you contact details if you need them.
Regds Peter

[UweM3]

Uwe.....Why dont you consider having a custom loom made...(As I did with mine), probably not as expensive as you think. TOTAL peice of mind when you switch on & much neater as well. Can give you contact details if you need them.
Regds Peter

Forgot about your loom! I think it is from G......?

[Ptr]

Forgot about your loom! I think it is from G......?
_________________

Yes From Gee....quality peice of kit, using all lightweight wires & prpoer connectors etc

[Dreamracer1]

The trouble with connectors like those used on the CBS panel is they're scewed. I mean screws come loose with vibration and compressing copper wire (they even loosen in domestic situations, and there ain't no vibration!).
Relays are there for a purpose, don't be tempted to get away without them. As Martin Pallot said, you will loose switchgear, or worse. I think you did incredibly well to rewire a rally car in one weekend (you must have passed up on food and sleep).

[nlr]

I rewired my tech 1 sport (road car) with a loom from big bavarian beauties which was supposed to be from another sport but it was wrong
since they did not want to help me and I was out of money I made a working loom from the 2 looms.
be wary of 2nd hand stuff !
Its not as bad a job as people say if you are practically minded but take your time and think of the money your saving to spend on shiny things

[a_kara]

Forgot about your loom! I think it is from G......?
_________________

Yes From Gee....quality peice of kit, using all lightweight wires & prpoer connectors etc

details ?

pm if needed