Interesting electrical problem

[challenged72]

So the previous owner in all of his wisdom did some crazy wiring to this car...

under the dash is a terrible rats nest, and the stereo is wired in without any insulation or anything

I have 3 major problems

the car needs jumped each time I start it, the alt is good and the battery is good. Whats next to check, the ground wire?

the entire gauge cluster will not light up, the dome light works when the doors are open though, and the headlights turn signals and taillights work. I tried the dimmer switch on the left hand siide and nothing

he did some really weird theft prevention, he wired it so that it wont start unless a switch mounted under the dash is flipped down, and the turn signal is turned on after putting it on accessory. You also have to move the wheel around to get it to crank when your turning the key

any suggestions? Would it be possible to pull the whole harness and redo it myself successfully?

Thanks in advance for any help

[Bullitt-]

Does the battery actually need charging?  If you KNOW the battery & alternator are good what's left is the voltage regulator, & grounds . A poor connection or bad wire to the starter can cause the won't crank symptom too.

  Cluster lights could be a poor ground...they do have to be screwed to the dash or other ground provided... Also the panel dimmer switches are notorious for going bad, sometimes some contact cleaner will bring one back.

 Harnesses can be brought back...lot of patients & attention to detail... Good used are hard to come by & new are very expensive.   A lot of the terminals are available for your harness.

[dodj]

So the previous owner in all of his wisdom did some crazy wiring to this car...

under the dash is a terrible rats nest, and the stereo is wired in without any insulation or anything

I have 3 major problems

the car needs jumped each time I start it, the alt is good and the battery is good. Whats next to check, the ground wire?

the entire gauge cluster will not light up, the dome light works when the doors are open though, and the headlights turn signals and taillights work. I tried the dimmer switch on the left hand siide and nothing

he did some really weird theft prevention, he wired it so that it wont start unless a switch mounted under the dash is flipped down, and the turn signal is turned on after putting it on accessory. You also have to move the wheel around to get it to crank when your turning the key

any suggestions? Would it be possible to pull the whole harness and redo it myself successfully?

Thanks in advance for any help

For the jump starting every time, something is staying on after you turn off the ignition switch and draining the battery (assuming as you say the battery is good). I'm not sure what to make of "not installed with any insulation" - Bare wire? Bare connections?
If it's not the grounding, it's possible the dash lights just aren't plugged into the orange mold connector. As Bullitt said 'the panel dimmer switches are notorious for going bad, sometimes some contact cleaner will bring one back.'
Do you really have to activate the turn signals to start the car? Does it ever start with the turn signals off and shaking the wheel while turning the ignition switch?

Can you make your own harness? Absolutely. Time patience and attention to detail and a print. I can scan the print for you if you want to go that route.
BruteForce listed good connection practices in another post in this section. I think it is the one about alternator upgrading.

[Challenger6pak]

With this you have so many possibilities of problems.  I wouldn't pull the harness out yet.  I would just go through it wire by wire and hook everything up properly.  At this point you will have a baseline to work from. Then you should be able to find and fix the problems.  Then you can pull the harness and rewrap it if you want.  As others have said you can redo the harness yourself.  It can be frustrating and tedious.

[Aussie Challenger]

  When you shut everything down you should disconnect the battery and check with volt meter. Put one lead from the volt meter on the disconnected cable, the other on the battery terminal and see if the meter has a reading, should be zero, if you have any voltage then there is something drawing current.
  For an excersie you can run jumper a wire directly from battery to coil + side and trip the starter with another wire and see if car will start. Another test would be check battery voltage while cranking, shouldn't drop much below 10 volts, below 8 volts and the battery should be checked.
  Remember that the firewall connector is nearly 40 years old and has been known to cause problems.   

[dutch]

sounds pretty scary to me....  remember a lot of these cars burned due bad wiring   
My cuda had some scary issues when I bought it. I got me an original wiring diagram before putting in a battery and checked every wire. I cut out a plastic bag full of non original wires and I was glad I did... I found some very dangerous stuff and still am surprised the car didn`t burn down.
I`m rebuilding the car now and got new wiring from ron francis.

[BIGSHCLUNK]

We often end up with cars with goofy "theft prevention " wiring. What we do is follow the non-OEM wiring, see where it was spliced in and GET RID OF IT!! Them put the OEM wiring back together. He's got to have some cuts in the stock wiring somewhere. 

But as its been said.... do you KNOW your battery is good?

[tommyg29]

Sounds to me like he did a great job of theft protection. They'll need a tow truck for sure!
 
Seriously, I'd start under the dash by removing the radio first and all its wiring just so you can see what you have. Pay particular attention to behind the dash (amp meter) and the bulkhead connector on the firewall. Or at least thats what I can gather from my limited experience in electrical matters, but lots of recent research on this board.
Countless years of experience and knowledge represented here!
Good luck with it

[BruteForce]

under the dash is a terrible rats nest, and the stereo is wired in without any insulation or anything

Before you do anything else, disconnect the battery and fix or disconnect any wires that are uninsulated (unless they are ground connections). Otherwise, you could have a bunch of melted wires and connections, or even a fire.

(I have a quick battery disconnect switch for mine. I always disconnect the battery before working on the car, I don't want the starter to come on with my hands in the fan!)

I'd pull the harness out and redo it. With the starting problem, I'd also do a visual inspection of all the wires under the hood. Look for any wires that appear out of place, broken, frayed, corroded, etc. If they have aftermarket crimp-on terminals on them, these can go bad even while looking just fine (they need to be crimped and soldered).

The jumping problem could be caused by power not getting to the starter relay that sits aft of the battery. I'd pull the wire to the start relay that triggers it to see if it is getting power, if not, start tracing back from there.

My starter relay trigger comes through a switch mounted on the clutch pedal. If the pedal is not depressed, the relay doesn't get power. That switch could be bad or not hooked up right, maybe it's part of the previous owner's theft prevention system  . For an auto tranny, I think there's a "neutral switch" on the tranny that performs the same function.

[challenged72]

by no insulation I mean the bare wires were just twisted together with no electrical tape or anything

I went and checked the ground wire, its brittle and barely connected, so that solves that problem I hope.

so If I get a new dimmer switch that may take care of the gauges then?

I think I might just redo the harness myself with all new wires, I have an extra harness as well that came with the car, Im not sure exactly what its from but its from a mopar, it has a different fuse relay though. Im going to be stripping the car down bare anyways

Also I know the battery is good, its brand new

Thanks for all of the awesome advice, it helps a lot

[BruteForce]

by no insulation I mean the bare wires were just twisted together with no electrical tape or anything

These are easily fixed. Get a pack of those crimp-on butt connectors from Shuck's or Radio Shack. Use the smallest ones that'll fit over your wire gauge. Get some heat shrink tubing from Radio Shack, and if you don't have a thermostat-controlled soldering iron, get that, too. Pull the connection apart, straighted the bare wire ends. If they're at all corroded (and they will be) cut off the ends, and strip some new ends. Put a 1.5" of heat shrink tubing on one of the wires. Cut the insulator off the butt connector. Install the butt connector and crimp it on. Next, solder it. Just stick the tip of the iron in the center, and push hard on it to get some heat transfer. Melt the solder not with the iron, but by touching it to the hot connector, and the solder will wick itself nicely into the joint. (If it doesn't wick, the joint isn't hot enough or the copper is corroded.)

Then, move the heat shrink tubing over the connection, and shrink it on with a cigarette lighter. You should then have a trouble-free long lasting connection.

If the butt connector is too big for the wire ends, strip a longer portion of the wire and fold it over to double its size before sticking it in the connector.

Remember to put the heat shrink tubing on before crimping the connection! I always screw that up.

It's a lot easier to solder if you can pull the harness out and fix it on your bench. I've not been successful at soldering upside down, durn solder drips on me 

[dodj]

  It's a lot easier to solder if you can pull the harness out and fix it on your bench. I've not been successful at soldering upside down, durn solder drips on me 

Gravity can be a real problem

[Traction Dynamics]

You might look at the wire that is for the clock and memory for the radio if it is an aftermarket piece. Sometimes the radio will go bad and drain the Batt. best bet is pull apart all bare connections and put together right.