Headlight wiring...

[RckymtnOpel]

I bought 3 different colors of wire in 8 ft lengths in 10 gauge thickness for the re-wire job im doing on my GT so i can feel safe using the lights and also upgrade to h-4's.... I'm seeing that ogts says to use 8 gauge.... will my 10 gauge wire still work or should i go get 8???


thanks all
RMO

[bozkm]

Can someone tell me the placement of the yellow, brown and white wiring on the headlight recepticle. I'm replacing my wires (this is so far a PAIN)..all the old wires insulation is off, so I don't know which color goes where. Unwrapping the harness will be real hard, so I'm going the run the wires in parallel.

Thanks,

[nobody]

The brown is your ground and the yellow and white run all the way back to the headlamp relay under the dash. They are split to run both lights. To answer the other Colorado Question 10 would be fine I don't know why OGTS would reccomend 8, I believe the original wire was a 1.5 so it would be in the range of 10 or 12.

[RckymtnOpel]

cool thanks man i might as weel start the job then... do you think 8 feet of each wire is long enough to do the job?

[Gary]

Another tip when buying headlight wire is to get "MTW" (Machine Tool Wire)grade wire. MTW has a flexible insulation jacket.

[nobody]

8 feet, you have to go from the passenger side light to the drivers side light. Then you have to get to the relay under the dash unless you intend to splice in somewhere. I like the Olflex wire from Germany I've put it in some bad environments and it always held up. GE Supply is the distributor in your area.

[bozkm]

My question was for the recepticle that hooks onto the headlight. This is a 3 pronger....how do the colors hook up on this?

Also, in my adventure of doing this, I was trying to adjust the headlight buckets. They lock into the open position real good..nice and stiff. I can't seem to get them to lock closed. If you push on them, it feels like its going against the spring, but will never lock. So my problem is the bucket now sticks up about 1/2 inch, and you can move it back and forth about 1/2 inch..any ideas??

Thanks,

[bozkm]

also, the tech article which OGTS sent me said to use 14 gauge for the wires...I bought 12.

[RckymtnOpel]

ahh yes,
im looking at my tech flyer and it does say 14 gauge...oops my bad, i might go trade my 10 in for 14 but do you guys think 8 feet will do it? maybe i should get that "MTW" wire in 14 G so when i do this project, i do it once, where would i find Machine Tool Wire.. at a machine shop supply or would a checker or napa have it?... yeah im going to try to do this without taking my head lights all apart these things are a pain to figure out and worse to put back together... so Bozkm-your just running your new wire along side the old set up so you don't have to take it all apart huh... will there be a problem leaving the old wires in there? that is a GREAT idea because i can't even get my main bundle out of the rubber insulator that feeds it into the battery compartment, so are you going to feed it parallel through the same hole? I'm kinda glad someone els is taking on this project at the same time so i can share the headache, now what what did you take apart to make the buckets is stick out 1/2 an inch and is it the same on both sides as far as having all this play?

sorry bozkm ...trying to help but having as much trouble as you,
RMO

[Gary]

Home Depot may have it. Any electrical supply house will. NAPA would probably call it "Automotive wire". It's very flexible.

[bozkm]

I'm going to try to pull the wiring out of the headlight area, and tape them all up inside that access hole..hopefully it will work. That driver's side is a pain in the....because of the master cylinder.

I just bought the car, so the headlights have always stuck up a little. I tightened the 3 8MM bolts (they were all loose), now the headlights actually lock open with no movement, but they won't lock in the closed position. They don't bind, cuz you can actually push on them, and "feel" them going into that mechanism...it just won't catch and stay. Both are equal. So, now that they are partially open, the white light on the dash is on.

[GTJIM]

When you remove the old wires firmly tie a single run of scrap wire to the ends and drag it through the hole on the buckets so that it can be used to pull the new wires back through the other way again.

[greensmurf20]

you may have to adjust your headlight cable underneatht he lip of the nose peice. it could be adjusted wrong and not let your headlights roll far enough before the lever moves to its full extent. the headlight wires are not that bad, i found all the info i needed to re-wire my headlights on the forums here somewhere, i couldn't see the colors the origional wires were supposed to be so i had to look up what color went where on the 3 prong connector. right near the radiator support is where the origional wire splits from one wire, to 2 wires to feed both lights. you can just tie into here and you should be fine unless that wire is junk to, under normal circumstances it will be ok tho. you dont have to run your ground to the origional place, make the ground wire as short as you can, less mess and the shorter the wire, the less resistance it will have, which is always better. if nobody posts here with what color wires go where, i'll pull a headlight cover off my car and tell which ones are which color. i used the wire i think gary is talking about. its 3 flexable wires all wrapped in a nice rubber outer coating. sorta like a power cord for a shop vac or drop light or something, only alot bigger wire. its nice having that extra coating to protect the wires, i recomend it, about 89 cents a foot in my area and i bought 15 feet to do the whole car with a little left over.

[bozkm]

I was thinking about the cable adjustment...But I also thought that if I messed with it to make them close, that they would open all the way...I guess I can try, the adjustment is pretty easy to do. Here is one thing that bothers me...put your headlights in the halfway position...can you grab the buckets and move them back and forth about a 1/2 inch or so WITHOUT actually move the cable. This is the play in the mechanisms..but its exactly the same on both.

More playing tomorrow, I guess. thanks for the help.

Kevin.,

[nobody]

Ok the brown is to the right of the socket as you face the lamp, white being to the left, yellow is on top. There are two adjustments for travel under the hood and another under the car in the transmission tunnel. Just as you lift the hood, under the front edge, you will see the actuator cable assembly. There is a metric socket head screw that will allow the arm connecting the two lights to be adjusted if they are not moving the same left to right. The passenger light can be adjusted here to make movement the same. Just under the front body lip you will see the attachment point of the actuating cable and the cable movement length can be adjusted by the use of the two nuts that hold the cable end in place. There is a similar adjustment inside the transmission tunnel where the cable is attached after the ball end at the actuator. The cable end adjustments will adjust your total throw, be sure that before adjusting here that the actuator lever is firmly bolted in place and there are no obstuctions to it's travel by either loose parts in the mechanism or a miss aligned cover or handle. If you have recently removed the bucket itself you should align the bucket itself before any adjustments are made to insure proper placement before cable or arm adjustments are made. To ensure proper bucket placement measure left right top and bottom gaps to be sure of center. Left and right adjustment can be done by loosening the three bolts in the top attachment arm or by loosening the 2 attaching bolts for the lower pivot. Care should be taken to ensure proper height adjustment on the lower pivot and by way of the upper two bolts on the upper attachment arm. the bucket itself should be almost flush when in the opened position and completely flush when closed. To adjust top to bottom loosen the lower jam nut on the center of the lower pivot point and adjust ckockwise for up and countrclockwise for down. when satisfied of center loosen the upper three bolts to relieve any pressure placed on the attachment flex arms. recheck all alignments for the buckets and procede with any linkage or cable adjustments as needed. The gear assembly is proportioned meaning it has a gear reduction at the actuator lever. For full use and function the headlights must me moved by use of the actuation lever. A good wiring measure from right to left headlamp is 6 feet to alllow for everything and from drivers to relay would be 8 leaving some extra room. That's the best I can do from memory of the workstad manual. HTH