It's clipped in.

 

A trip to a "local" junkyard paid dividends this time. It's 30 miles away but had a few things i could use including the heater switch & wiring. $15 for that so it was worth the trip just for that, let alone the other items.

Found my soldering iron and solder spool. But i don't have any heat shrink just regular plastic sheathed wire connectors. I may as well do this right so a quick trip to the auto parts store should do it.

Before i do that i will compare the two units side by side to be perfectly sure this will work.

 

Ugh. Got the whole unit in - what a pain in the @#$%

And...

Nada.

I made sure to re-install the heater blower motor and reconnect its power, as well as to make sure the various power connectors were good to go on the unit.

So, either I have a bad unit from the junkyard (which was still in the dash of an otherwise not-yet-picked-over truck) or I have a short elsewhere too.

Blower doesn't work in any position. AC/Heat does nothing.

If the prior unit is what blew the ground in the plug (which actually fell apart while I cut off those wires, by the way) what else may have gone kablooie?

 

@subford

I have attempted to find the G201 Ground Wire per your prior diagram post. Where on the back of the dash is it? From the diagram I'd expect behind the gas pedal or slightly more toward the center of the truck.

The only thing I found is a wire that appears to be connected to the radio. But frankly the radio connection is an absolute mess. And this also uncovers two unplugged connectors - to what I have no idea.


dash elec connectors

And another photo


bunch of wires for radio

I just now unplugged all the stereo wires I could find - two large black connectors were in the square box in the center. One is in my hand the other is above the ash tray. Those were all in when I tried to power up the heater / AC.

I did find two wires (both black, one large one small) that is attached to the dash just to the right of the fuse box on the left side of the steering column leg well. That seems intact. I'll test it once the thunderstorm is passed.

Before I yanked it out the radio did work. It was installed wrong - the faceplate of that unit wasn't removable AND the unit was too big to take the compartment plate off. I ended up destroying the radio getting it out, which is fine since it's from the 90's at best. I believe the PO or more likely the owner before him put this thing in.

The radio is what we used to make sure the truck was off and not in accessory position since we had to manually advance the ignition with a screwdriver while the ignition cylinder etc is being fixed. Truck was that way when we bought it and continues that way until I get the ignition fully repaired.

I figured several of these items might be on a single circuit or fuse. So, I tried the cigarette lighter while the ignition was in Accessory position. It worked. Popped back out after maybe 15 sec or so.

One more thing. That gold double wire coming out of the stereo compartment is clearly for rear speakers. I don't know where it runs but it does go behind the rear bench seat. But the truck doesn't have speakers behind the rear seats any longer. Again, that way when I bought it.



[***************]Save[/COLOR]

 

The barrel in the picture looks like a fusible link to me, did you check to see if you had power before the barrel?

Not sure about the G201 but did you look near your parking brake, there should be a ground bolt there.

Did you check to see if you actually had power coming in and out of the fan selector switch?

 

I have not probed the wire before the barrel - i.e. closer to the dash. I will do that.

I did find the ground wire on the dash near the fuse panel. I'll check that too.

 

I went to the junk yard and found another heater control switch to swap out. Since the prior one had definitely melted down right at the power connection, I needed one anyway.

I wired in the new-ish one which seemed to be good. I got nada. So I am thinking I have another short somewhere between the dash wiring and the engine compartment - which would seem to suggest that barrel. More on that after I get a few other fixes done. I gotta get this thing registered.

 

Ok, quick update on this.

The mechanic friend I had over to help me with the steering column / ignition / power steering pump swap is also an electrician. He found my wiring work below standard and fixed it.

Once properly connected, the new(er) control unit immediately began heating. And even better news is that the A/C compressor does in fact function well. The A/C would blow but wouldn't get cold. We refilled it with what little bit of refrigerant that was left in my R134 can (my truck was previously converted) and it *started* to get cold. So we probably just need to drain & refill.

 

Glad to hear you got it working.

 

And old parts being old, now the airflow selector has broken. All I get is defrost. Ugh.

 

Usually that indicates a broken vacuum line.