raVeneyes
Dedicated LVC Member
Most of you folks just met me, but Geno and Matt both know me well. I live across the street from Geno and we've been friends ever since he offered to help me swap the fuel pump on the truck.
Matt met me the day he had the NOS installed on his car. Little known fact, Geno hates wiring (amongst other things, but that wasn't on his list). I love wiring...I love anything technical and geeky, and since NOS requires a bit of wiring to install I went on over to help.
Now this was a bit of a rush job...the NOS had to be installed the same day Matt brought down the car, so everyone is counting on me to get the system's power routed through the maze that is a Lincoln Mark VIII's engine bay and interior in a couple of hours. The wiring is simple enough...power from the battery, to the master arm switch, to the trigger switch, to the celanoids. No biggie. Geno thought he'd be funny and make it a challenge by adding a bottle opener and heater. Still no biggie, master arm switch just now has to carry more load and distribute it to three things instead of one.
We wanted this to be a nice looking install, so Geno and I decided to ditch the ugly toggle that came with the kit and go down to RadioShack to pick up a nice one. I rummaged through the bins and found one marked with the appropriate load limits and poles. The install went easy enough, even with the car's owner looking on forlornly as his interior was disassembled and re-assembled. Finally we're ready to test...and I'm ahead of projected schedule and feeling pretty good about myself.
Matt hops in and clicks the trigger a couple of times to test the relay...then we test the bottle opener and heater. The bottle opener is having some problems so I ask Matt to do some switch flipping while I look at the works and test it with my volt meter.
Matt says suddenly "The switch won't flip"
"Which one? The toggle for the bottle?"
"No, the Master arm switch...it's stuck...and it's a little warm"
Good thing my first instincts are usually to head towards a problem.
I get to the back corner of the window and start to see white smoke coming from the dash and vents...not good...don't want a $30K car to go up in Geno's driveway...nope nope nope...not good at all.
I go to the front (this is a good reason to leave your hoods up while testing stuff ladies and gents) and pull the battery, which averts a natural disaster of Mark VIII proportions.
Turns out the new toggle from Radio shack had a ground fault in it...and I would end up spending the next two hours re-doing 90% of what I had just finished.
What install horrors have you guys gone through?
Matt met me the day he had the NOS installed on his car. Little known fact, Geno hates wiring (amongst other things, but that wasn't on his list). I love wiring...I love anything technical and geeky, and since NOS requires a bit of wiring to install I went on over to help.
Now this was a bit of a rush job...the NOS had to be installed the same day Matt brought down the car, so everyone is counting on me to get the system's power routed through the maze that is a Lincoln Mark VIII's engine bay and interior in a couple of hours. The wiring is simple enough...power from the battery, to the master arm switch, to the trigger switch, to the celanoids. No biggie. Geno thought he'd be funny and make it a challenge by adding a bottle opener and heater. Still no biggie, master arm switch just now has to carry more load and distribute it to three things instead of one.
We wanted this to be a nice looking install, so Geno and I decided to ditch the ugly toggle that came with the kit and go down to RadioShack to pick up a nice one. I rummaged through the bins and found one marked with the appropriate load limits and poles. The install went easy enough, even with the car's owner looking on forlornly as his interior was disassembled and re-assembled. Finally we're ready to test...and I'm ahead of projected schedule and feeling pretty good about myself.
Matt hops in and clicks the trigger a couple of times to test the relay...then we test the bottle opener and heater. The bottle opener is having some problems so I ask Matt to do some switch flipping while I look at the works and test it with my volt meter.
Matt says suddenly "The switch won't flip"
"Which one? The toggle for the bottle?"
"No, the Master arm switch...it's stuck...and it's a little warm"
Good thing my first instincts are usually to head towards a problem.
I get to the back corner of the window and start to see white smoke coming from the dash and vents...not good...don't want a $30K car to go up in Geno's driveway...nope nope nope...not good at all.
I go to the front (this is a good reason to leave your hoods up while testing stuff ladies and gents) and pull the battery, which averts a natural disaster of Mark VIII proportions.
Turns out the new toggle from Radio shack had a ground fault in it...and I would end up spending the next two hours re-doing 90% of what I had just finished.
What install horrors have you guys gone through?
