Grounding Ourselves

Lots of progress this week. We mocked up the gauges in the dash so we could build wiring assemblies. You'll have to take our word for that, as we pulled it back apart without taking any pictures.

We installed the battery in its tray and ran the main battery cables. We're not ready to connect the battery just yet, so the leads are still loose.

Our decision to use electrical relays complicated our wiring job a little, but will pay dividends. Relays allow us to use the cool switches we want to use without worrying about burning them out by running high-amperage current through them. A relay allows us to use a low-amp signal current to close a switch on a much more powerful circuit. We used them to power the blinkers, brake lights, ignition, and headlights. We will also have them for the engine fan, wipers, and remote door openers.

We also want to be able to remove the dash later if needed to troubleshoot any problems, and that means installing some extra connectors. You can see nine black cube-shaped relays and four white conectors in this picture.

This picture shows a small tray we made to mount four of the relays. We didn't want to drill any extra holes in the firewall, so we came up with the tray idea.

My assistant builder spent much of our time today installing grounds for our electrical system. This involves drilling a hole in the steel frame, sanding off the powdercoating to get a good ground, then installing the ground wire and hitting it with some paint to protect the steel from rusting.

If the weather holds, we're hoping to start the engine during the long Thanksgiving Day weekend. Our to-do list for starting the car didn't get much shorter this week, but the tasks on it are much smaller than they used to be.