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2002 Windsor Spare wires from front to back


jacwjames

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Has anyone had any success finding spare wires.  I am installing a Blue Sea ML-ARC battery auto contactor to eliminate the BIRD, Isolation relay, and battery maintainer.   I need one spare wire for the switch to replace the auxiliary start switch with the Blue Sea Switch. 

So I've pulled the top and side off the console where the Allison shifter is mounted.

I found a 4 wire plug not being used but it is labeled Compression brake, all wires are white. I found a two wire plug that is labeled exhaust brake, both wires are white. I do have a Pac Brake switch that does work.

I pulled the dash and could not find any wires visible there.  Also looked in the drivers side front electrical bay, no wires there!

I pulled the black cover on the fire wall in front of the steering column and found a single brown wire there.

I pulled both engine hatch covers in the bedroom. I did not find any wire under the large hatch in the closet. I found 2 sets of wires under the small hatch. One set there is a white and brown wire, the white wire is spliced together with a butt connector the brown wire just exposed. The second set has a white and brown wire just looped.

I crawled under the rear of coach on the passenger side and looked behind the electrical panel and the wiring along the chassis rail. NO wires that I could see.

I looked around the compressor and fuel injection pump, NO wires there.

I'm hesitant to try and use the 2 harnesses in the front for the compression/exhaust brake since they may be routed through the Allison controller.

I'm going to get a tone tracer and see if I can trace the wires from the rear to the front and the one in the front.

Does anyone have suggestions on other places to look.

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I don't know if this is relevant with our different coaches, but when I installed the ML-ARC in our coach I found wires in the FRB and traced them back to wires in the main bundle of wires going to the RRB.  I had to take the wrapping off the bundle, and take the tape off, but it was worth it not having to route new wires from front to back.  By the way the bundle I am talking about has maybe 50-75 wires in it.  I used a tone generator first and then checked continuity to be sure I had the right ones.

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Were they just loose in the bundle but taped up??  I did not find any loose wire in my RRB. 

I looked in the FRB but did not see any loose wires or looms.  Everything is pretty tight in there, not a lot of slack in the wiring looms. 

I am going to borrow or buy a tone generator/tracer.  Hopefully I'll get lucky. 

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I went to replace my backup camera and found the cable that ran to it consisted of 5 pairs. Not only did I change out my camera, I Added 3 more. I have found that Monaco was big on over wiring their coaches. Apparently they wired all of the coaches the same. My  drawings are very accurate, if a wire is orange in the front it is orange in the back. I was pleasntly surprised to find it was even prewired for solar. I would keep looking at what is hooked up and if an item needs 2 wires and the cable looks oversized, maybe it haves more to offer. Just my 2 cent.

Just_John

1997 Dynasty. 40' 2006 Jeep Cherokee. 

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Tried to find the spare wires on our 04 Dynasty, found the ones in the dash but could not find where they were in the back of the coach. Gave up and mounted the brake controller in the engine compartment (took 45 minutes) and then a year later, behind the rear run box, I found the four wires connected to a white plug….same as in the dash near the steering column.

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Thanks for the reply. 

I made one last futile attempt to find any spare wires and could not.  Bought a tone tracer and tried to see whether the one loose wire I found in the front was the one loose wire in the rear, it was not.  Used the tone generator probe all around the back of the engine and could not pick up any signal so I gave up on the spare wire option. 

Instead I just pulled 5  each of 14 awg wire front to back.  I only need 1 wire for the ML-ACR switch so I will have 4 extra.   Just got done with that and will tackle installing the Blue Sea ACR Sunday or Monday. 

 

 

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Jim, I have never seen a single case where those wires did not exist, although since they are in loom covering and taped up, they are hard to find.  Sounds like you solved the problem.  I actually did the same thing when needing wiring for EGT gage and fuel pressure gage--I ran TWO 14AWG X (7) multiconductor cables from front to rear and terminated them in barrier terminal strips front and rear.  In the rear, I mounted them on the rear "firewall" (bedroom rear wall) and in the front Ieft the two terminal strips accessible from the "hatch" above the instrument panel.

Although I have found the "spare" wires on both my Dynastys, adding these two cables made it much easier to add anything I needed with minimal difficulty in the future.

Pix are:

(2) 7-conductor cables (mostly unused so far)

Fuse block added to supply additional loads in engine bay

Contactor added in Rear Run Bay to supply fuse block

Close-up of contactor

(8) T-145 batteries, approximately 1000 AH

Chassis batteries relocated to Driver Side rear of engine compartment

BEFORE ML-ACR installation

AFTER ML-ACR installation

Blue Sea master disconnect switches

 

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Thanks Van. 

I finished my install today, which was pretty simple.  No real issues. 

For the time being I'm just leaving the battery maintainer in place along with the BIRD.  Once I get a trip under my belt and confirm no problems with the Blue Sea ML-ARC I'll remove. 

I will say that if the ARC works as advertised it makes the charging system much simpler and with the switch on the front dash you have the ability to turn it off if you want.  I did start the coach and started the generator to see if it would throw the Alt Fail light, it did not.   

 

 

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Jim,

I leave it in the "automatic" mode (center position), which combines both house and chassis batteries IFF there is any charging source available.  If no charging source is detected (you were driving, then stopped and turned off engine with no genny running) in "automatic" mode, the ML-ACR (after a short delay) disconnects the chassis battery from the house batteries and all house functions are supplied only by the house battery bank, preserving the charge on the chassis batteries.

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