The Dodge Challenger Message Board

Looks awesome with the cf. Silver and Black. Perfect IMHO.

Tom

The Painless kit looks a bit scary when you first take it out of the box.

But it does not look so bad when you lay it out into its various sections.

Here are the various bits in roughly the area they need to be in.

Cool to see you are making good progress with your electrical work Dave! Once again, i like the idea of "carbonfiber" in the panels, i think i am going to do the same, but not with "real" material. Are you going to have standard cluster in the panel Dave? accept for the Autometer Tacho? I wonder where you can get aftermarket panels for new cluster/ gauges? I think i have seen some guy of us members in this forum that had some "new" panel in his Challenger, can anybody recall or confirm this, i like to see that once again and get a link to where you buy these?

dave-r wrote:The Painless kit looks a bit scary when you first take it out of the box.

But it does not look so bad when you lay it out into its various sections.

Wiring has alway's scared me, Dave. That painless stuff still look's like a pain to me. That's why I alway's have somebody else do the major wiring stuff. Your car is looking Sweet!

It helps that every wire is labled along its length stating what it is for. There is alo a number printed on each wire that you can look up in a table and it tells you where the wire starts from and ends up at.

So it is not that bad really. But it still takes a lot of planning and head scratching. In particular when you are like me and have things mounted away from their stock locations and want to wire things up differently to stock.

dave-r wrote:It helps that every wire is labled along its length stating what it is for. There is alo a number printed on each wire that you can look up in a table and it tells you where the wire starts from and ends up at.

That's how I installed the new YearOne dash harness in my car last week. I took one hour to label all wires with numbers, and writing down what each number was for (from the shop manual).
It's much easier to have just one sheet of paper to check out when you're lying on yout back inside the car with a Maglite stuck between your teeth, than to have to check the wiring diagram in the 600-page shop manual...

Made some progress with the wiring but this lot turned up today and as storage space is limited I am going to fit this lot before doing anything else.

i love getting boxes of car stuff,looks like you have some fun work to do, send as many pics as possible on the wiring, i looked into that kit for mywifes gran coupe ill keep watching dave as you like me have altered cars , i did come across just one or two street rods that have managed to hide every wire on the whole engine bay , looke trick to see a motorcompartment with no wiring not one in site im sure you all have seen those street rods, they hide wires in the strangest places

I have just about finished wiring the trunk area. Which is just as it was originally except for the use of LED lamps and my UK spec turn signals hidden behind the "reflectors".

dave-r wrote:I have just about finished wiring the trunk area. Which is just as it was originally except for the use of LED lamps and my UK spec turn signals hidden behind the "reflectors".

uk spec i gotta see that if you can

ok the pic just came up sweet i like that dave ,man,nice idea!

Sorry. I posted before I added the correct photo. It is there now.

dave-r wrote:Sorry. I posted before I added the correct photo. It is there now.

man that is so col i dont think anyone has done that

See the silver painted lamp housings between the stock units?

oh yea that is soo sanitary too, so uk specs require different color for turn signal?

drewcrane wrote:

dave-r wrote:Sorry. I posted before I added the correct photo. It is there now.

man that is so col i dont think anyone has done that

I did it many years ago and I think you are correct that I am the only one to have done that on a Chally at least. It took some guts to cut up the lenses because at the time reproductions were not available.
The reflectors have been replaced with clear plastic from some reversing lights and painted with a thin coat of red paint on the inside to tint them. Amber lamps do the rest in two housings I found in a front bumper at a breakers yard.

drewcrane wrote:oh yea that is soo sanitary too, so uk specs require different color for turn signal?

Yep. Flashing red pre-1968 only. After that date they must be amber.

This is for the Ministry of Transport test (MOT test) which is a safety test all cars over 3 years old have to go through every year.

Most people in the UK get away for it by either having a freindly MOT tester or they add extra lights just for the test and remove them later.

I just didn't want the hassle.

Of course we are supposed to have reflectors as well. But the MOT testers never seem to notice that!

yes the way you did it it doesnt really show, so its clean, and yes those lenses are now custom, wow what alot of safty testing i wish we had that , it does make things alot safer with those and other guide lines,we dont have ANYTHING like that you should see some of our cars , but thats another story

Thats really clean and cool!

Cool with the lights and I really want to HEAR the exhaust system installed. With and with out the cutouts................

DAYLEY/CHALLENGER wrote:Cool with the lights and I really want to HEAR the exhaust system installed. With and with out the cutouts................

What he said!!!

patrick wrote:

DAYLEY/CHALLENGER wrote:Cool with the lights and I really want to HEAR the exhaust system installed. With and with out the cutouts................

What he said!!!

Yeah! Agree... Specially without...

I like your installation of the turnsignal Dave, real sweet & clean. We also must have in orange turn signals in Sweden, but we are lucky to not need that on older cars. But i think that is cool, it doesn't do anything but good on the look.

i like the tail light solution dave i may be required to have amber turn signals when i go to rego mine so ill keep your idea in mind it looks great well done
cheers ian

Looks like things are progressing nicely Dave.

Are you going to have a remote control to the cutouts on the exhaust? That would be so cool to open them up for a second or two in the middle of town. One sure way to impress your friends.

That is a yes Jon.

dave-r wrote:That is a yes Jon.

dave do you know anybody that has done remote control cutouts? my exhaust guy wont put them on for me lol he says they will get condensation from the exhaust and eventually fail, what do you think?i want them bad but my current system doesnt have room, i am really anxious to hear your car!

drewcrane wrote:dave do you know anybody that has done remote control cutouts?

Yes. The Quick Time Performance ones that I have. A few cars over here have them. Seem to work well. They normally operate with a momentary toggle switch that you hold up or down to open or close the exhaust.

But I have a controller that makes it even easier. Just an on/off switch connected to a yellow trigger wire and the controller opens/closes both fully and switches them off at exactly the right moment so the electric motors don't get over torqued.

http://www.quicktimeperformance.com/Controller/

Bugger.

I did worry about the overdrive getting in the way of the exhaust system. However I know a stock exhaust clears so hoped the TTI system would be the same.

No chance. Not even close to fitting.

In fact i am not sure it would have fit that well even without the overdrive to be honest. Seemed a bit short unless TTI headers are a lot longer than my "Dougs".

I am going to have to cut the mufflers-forward sections into at least 4 bits each side and re-arrange them. The cross-over H-pipe will have to be in a different location too.

Hopefully i will be able to do it without changing the way the mufflers hang so that changes to the tailpipe as it comes over the axle will not be needed. But I might need to cut and twist them if the mufflers need to move.

Probably take a fair bit of time to do this. Hard work too.

Oh well. Shit happens. And happens and happens....

Heh, every exhaust is custom. Sorry to hear about the problems. I've also heard that those remote cutouts fail quickly due to corrosion from exhaust/moisture/etc. Hope you have better luck!

My two cents is you ditch the whole exhaust idea. Not worth the trouble, I'd say!

Moparman1972 wrote:I've also heard that those remote cutouts fail quickly due to corrosion from exhaust/moisture/etc. Hope you have better luck!

The guys I know have been running them for a couple of years now. They are completely stainless steel so as long as I keep them clean they should last a long time.

I will let you know if i ever get the damn thing running to start with!