Here's the link to the wiring diagrams in the Technical Resource Library. They show the colors and where each wire goes.



John

To add to the fun of restoration wiring, there are instances where Ford mentions the color of the connector, not the color of the wire or tracer. Just adds to the fun level (and often to adult beverages!)

Joe is right and let me further explain:
When you see two colors like Blue/Red, that could mean two things; either the wire is blue with a red trace OR the wire is blue with a molded red end. If the wire is one color like 'Y', the wire will be yellow and so will the end connector.

Ok, so why? Ford had many suppliers for the millions of harnesses required in manufacturing cars, trucks, tractors, etc. There is no way Essex Wire could possibly make all the harnesses for Ford, GM, Chrysler, Checker, American Motors, etc., so the standards needed some 'wiggle room' to comply.

Here's an example of my headlight switch that was cut off of an original donor car:



Notice the color scheme matches the wiring diagrams. I see green/yellow, green, R/Y, O/Y etc. If you don't know or are familiar with GM-type standards this scheme is easy to miss. - Dave

Wiring harness

You can find a wiring harness in color on ebay, although it is not 100 percent correct, it will get you in the ball park. I'm working on mine also, but for me it is fix one wire and break two. LOL Where did you get a new harness? Due to the many patch jobs over the years, my bird has many wires that dont match anything so I may consider going your route and replace the complete harness. Lots of luck, let me know how you progress.

Good luck! I paid out the nose for a wiring harness that was suppose to be exactly like the factory OEM. So far I've spent 3 months and turned the air in my garage blue many times. All to end up with wired that had to be spliced to come close to the wiring scheme. The wiring guide that came with the harness didn't match anything I'd seen before and I ended up with 3 different guides so which code was right? The job is definitely NOT for the faint of heart.

I have found the wiring harnesses manufactured by Bauer Electronics to be pretty much spot-on matches to the wiring diagrams. Bauer produces most of the harnesses carried by the T-Bird vendors and all include their schematic, too. They are not inexpensive, but they are high quality and avoid a lot of time and frustration. Before I completely stripped my '60 convertible for restoration, I replaced several of the harnesses with Bauer reproductions and felt like their product made it pretty easy and I had virtually no car wiring/electronics experience at the time.

Chris Olsen (president of Bauer) is also very helpful if you have specific questions or requests. I recently contacted him about tail light/backup light and license plate sockets and pigtails as mine were really brittle. I sent him an example of each and he sent those back rewired along with all the pieces/parts for me to rewire the other sockets, all color-correct, and at a reasonable price.

Again please do not reopen old threads. This was from 2016. If you have something new to add open a new thread. Many of the original posters are no longer on the forum.

John

I'm looking for some "Old time Sound" mufflers for my '59 . I'd rather not get into cutting and welding so I want bolt on in case I decide to get back into show competition. I want something mellow and not so loud I cant hear the radio, Wife says I never listen to her anyway so that's no problem. LOL. Any ideas out there? Any suggestion would be appreciated.

Richard,

Can you please start a new thread regarding the mufflers. Changing topics in the middle of a thread is confusing.

John