Sabre
Overlanding Nurse
...and I'm man enough to admit it! In fact, I'm at the point in life where I didn't swear but rather just shook my head and had a quiet little laugh.
I'm installing a dual-band ham radio in the Montero and had read the "routing wires through the firewall" thread with interest. Since both the radio and the battery are on the driver's side, I wanted to avoid going over to the passenger side to access the big hole where the main wiring harness passes through. Crawling under the dash, I noted a nice bare spot up high, above the brake pedal. Under the hood, there's a nice clear area above the brake master cylinder. This area is where the fire wall goes from vertical to near-horizontal for a couple of inches, moving back toward the windshield before going vertical again. The nice thing about this spot is that there's no insulation on the inside...that stuff on the inside of the cabin is thick! There's just a thin layer of the stuff in the engine compartment, easy enough to drill through and then trim away to insert a rubber grommet.
So I drilled from the inside after measuring and checking several times. Wow, the metal seemed a lot thicker than I thought! I finally punched through and realized that the firewall here is actually doubled...two layers rather than one. No worries. I could see light through the thin layer of insulation so I put the bit back in and drilled on through.
Sparks! Hmmm...******?
Yes. Yes, I did. I really, really did!
I drilled straight through the CENTER of the main wiring harness bundle. No, boys and girls, not just a little bit. All the #@!!*%$ way! :Wow1:
The doubled fire wall in this area meant that my measurement was off by a couple of inches, since the two layers are not bent together but rather their radii are staggered. I was drilling only an inch from the radius on the INNER layer of metal, but several inches inside the lip on the OUTER layer. Yes, where the wiring bundle lives.
To add insult to injury, the sunroof was wide open and all the windows were down, and the front end was up on wheel ramps. And dark clouds were threatening. So I got a step ladder out, got my electrical tool box, and wished most sincerely that I could bend my elbows and wrists backwards. I clipped the harness loose from several anchor points but it still meant that I had to work on the damned thing in a cramped location, bent way over the fender, with almost no room to move my hands.
I unwrapped a couple of feet of the black covering, started separating the minute little wires in there and appraising the damage. Jeez, there are scores of little wires in that thing!
In the end I had spliced 19 of the little devils. It took hours to do the splices correctly and to re-wrap and re-anchor the harness. I was reminded, yet again, that I'm not a young buck any more...when I was done I felt like I had been run over by horses. Eek.
But, happily, everything works and I'm now smarter than I was yesterday morning. And I've been able to provide an entertaining little story for your amusement.
Go ahead. I can take it. :sombrero:
I'm installing a dual-band ham radio in the Montero and had read the "routing wires through the firewall" thread with interest. Since both the radio and the battery are on the driver's side, I wanted to avoid going over to the passenger side to access the big hole where the main wiring harness passes through. Crawling under the dash, I noted a nice bare spot up high, above the brake pedal. Under the hood, there's a nice clear area above the brake master cylinder. This area is where the fire wall goes from vertical to near-horizontal for a couple of inches, moving back toward the windshield before going vertical again. The nice thing about this spot is that there's no insulation on the inside...that stuff on the inside of the cabin is thick! There's just a thin layer of the stuff in the engine compartment, easy enough to drill through and then trim away to insert a rubber grommet.
So I drilled from the inside after measuring and checking several times. Wow, the metal seemed a lot thicker than I thought! I finally punched through and realized that the firewall here is actually doubled...two layers rather than one. No worries. I could see light through the thin layer of insulation so I put the bit back in and drilled on through.
Sparks! Hmmm...******?
Yes. Yes, I did. I really, really did!
I drilled straight through the CENTER of the main wiring harness bundle. No, boys and girls, not just a little bit. All the #@!!*%$ way! :Wow1:
The doubled fire wall in this area meant that my measurement was off by a couple of inches, since the two layers are not bent together but rather their radii are staggered. I was drilling only an inch from the radius on the INNER layer of metal, but several inches inside the lip on the OUTER layer. Yes, where the wiring bundle lives.
To add insult to injury, the sunroof was wide open and all the windows were down, and the front end was up on wheel ramps. And dark clouds were threatening. So I got a step ladder out, got my electrical tool box, and wished most sincerely that I could bend my elbows and wrists backwards. I clipped the harness loose from several anchor points but it still meant that I had to work on the damned thing in a cramped location, bent way over the fender, with almost no room to move my hands.
I unwrapped a couple of feet of the black covering, started separating the minute little wires in there and appraising the damage. Jeez, there are scores of little wires in that thing!
In the end I had spliced 19 of the little devils. It took hours to do the splices correctly and to re-wrap and re-anchor the harness. I was reminded, yet again, that I'm not a young buck any more...when I was done I felt like I had been run over by horses. Eek.
But, happily, everything works and I'm now smarter than I was yesterday morning. And I've been able to provide an entertaining little story for your amusement.
Go ahead. I can take it. :sombrero:
