Rewire 1980 f150 harness into 1985 f250, C208A dash electric connector
 

Hello Fellow Ford Owners,
Have a question for the fine electric minds. Ol'blue85 had a main electrical harness shorted out several wires and had to be replaced. I put a 1980 f150 wiring harness in it. In my search for answers regarding this swap i understand that it is impossible to use a 1980 wiring harness in anything but a 1980. The truck runs and the dash lights, head lights, turn signel lights and running lamps all work.
the following photos are of the C208A plug (From the old harness) i have found homes for all but 4 out of 18 wires.
That's where i hope that the FTE braintrust will come in with much appreciated assistance.

The first 2 wires are resting in bay 1 of the C208A plug. One is dark green with a lite green (the insulation says this is a resistance wire) stripe and the other is black. The second are in bays 11 and 12. Bay 11 has a wire that is green w/ yellow dots and bay 12 has a wire that is black (or purple) w/green dots too. Any information would be helpful. https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...23a00d6c53.jpg

Lower left: bay #1 2 wires, one dk green w/lt green stripe and a black in the same #1 bay. Anyone knows where thes go?
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...ab21fcc323.jpg

Bay #1
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...e3bd71829f.jpg

The 1986 wiring is the same as 1985 to my knowledge, you might see if the 1986 EVTM helps you:

1986 EVTM - ???Gary's Garagemahal

Hi @ctubutis,
unfortunately the 1985 harness is shot and all i have to work with is the 1980 harness which is already in the truck and works well.
With the 1980 harness inplace the truck runs, all front lights including turn signals work, dash and instrument lights, charging and start all work.
what i am trying to achieve is working gages, radio (am old school) and tail lights.
oh and the mystery 4 wires pictured above.

Gary has a great site there it was actually the first place i started. Unfortunately i need the 1980 from what i understand it's a odd ball year.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...aaa1fccd45.jpg
This has been the most helpful thing i could find. If i knew the name of the publication i would buy it but i dont even know the name.

You want the 1980 Light Truck EVTM - Electrical & Vacuum Troubleshooting Manual, Gary has 1981 & 1986 versions on his site. The 1980 model year has different wiring than all other years.

I see eBay has a listing or two from some guy named "mapster" for "diagnosis with the EVTM video reference book" but it's only 29 pages so I don't think it contains the actual EVTM itself, this looks like it's just some sort of printed reference book to go along with some sort of video (was probably a VHS cassette tape).

Look around at the places that sell used automotive literature. You could get the full wiring diagrams instead of the EVTM but they're not as easy to use and don't contain as much information as the EVTM does.

Lloyd's Auto Lit seems to have one, Lloyds Auto Liturature available for 1980, Fordtruck, All Categories

That resistance wire feeds power to the gauges. C208a is the connector that plugs into the instrument cluster.

Bay 11 and 12 are the tach wires. It's all in this diagram. Fuel Tank Selector & Gauges - ???Gary's Garagemahal

Hi ctubutis,
Light Truck EVTM - Electrical & Vacuum Troubleshooting Manual. I am on the the hunt now thank you. Lloyds auto great advice thank you.

Hi Dave,
That makes sence i didn't realize it was a resistance wire until i fully cleaned the wire, inproved the lighting and found my glasses. Getting old sucks. Lol. Thanks for your help.

Hello agan Dave,

I saw those in the diagram too, but since the truck didn't have a factory tack it became confusing fast. I noticed that 11 and 12 deadended shorty after the plug on the dash wiring printed filament. As shown here.https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...1f278787ed.jpg
Thanks Dave for your help!!

Thank guys for your help!! Appreciate your time and knowledge.
Lloyds is a gold mine!!

Looks like you have this figured out, but I just wanted to point out that the pics you show, which I presume are from your 1980 wiring harness, are from a truck with the full gauge package. The idiot light trucks would have a 14 bay connector instead of the 18 bay pictured.

You also mention your truck does not have a factory tach. I am not sure, but I believe all the 82 and up trucks used an 18 pin connector for the instrument panel and the wiring harness was the same for all models. Only the gauge head differed.

Hi Ray,
Actually the pictures are all of the 1985 components i was getting a idea of what the connections were routed thru the the dash. I must apologize it didnt mention both harnesses are of the gage type.
Thank you for pointing that out and for the additional information.

Well today while trying to get the gages to work with no success i pluged in a 3 prong plug that is behind the radio. https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...344ee91434.jpg

Right to left. 1st. Black 0 voltage @ run or acc. 2nd. Red green stripe 11.77 voltage @ run or acc. 3rd. Red (x 2) 14.38 voltage @ run or acc.
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...8922df9829.jpg

Right to left. 1st. Blue (x 2) 0 voltage @ run or acc. 2nd. Brown 0 voltage @ run or acc. 3rd. Red 0 voltage @ run or acc.

when i pluged these two plug together i got very dim dash lights and nothing else and these two plug wires are hardly long enough to click connet. I will trace these down tomorrow ran out of daylight.

First off, HUGE SHOUTOUT to Gary's Garagemahal!

I have the same connector for our 1985 project and need the pin out so that we can reuse the stock cluster. My question is that the diagram (bottom center, pins 17 and 18) the colors are swapped from my plug. Looking at the diagram the DG/LG and the LG/W are swapped. Looking at the above picture, his seems to swapped too. I pieced the wiring diagram together from Gary's site and wanted to make sure it looked correct to anyone that has had to pin out the C208A. Also Pin 1 has a resistance wire and what looks to be a regular wire, WHY?
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...b6c7daea67.jpg