72 Duster Resurrection

moparmat2000 said
You may want to concider doing an ammeter bypass down the road as well

moparmat2000 said
If upgrading to higher output alternator, you will need to increase size of alternator to battery wire.

moparmat2000 said
A lot of guys here do a headlamp relay mod as well.

Thanks for the info, I think all three of these upgrades on in my future here.

pishta said
You wanna start it gangsta style? Clip a roach from the battery + to the coil + side AND the blue/yellow trace prong of the ECU and hit the starter relay lugs with a screwdriver.

on the ballast resistor: The blue trace is hot in RUN and the yellow trace is hot only on START. Thats all you need for ignition/run/start.

Here is my first points ignition slant startup, hotwired of course...I didnt have the fuel hooked up so it died.

I like it! thats actually pretty much what I did to get the starter to move for the first time.

slantsixdan said
Before you go putting too much faith in the half-baked advice from the Chevy-heads at MAD Electrical, see here and here.

Lots to think about here, but you make some valid points. I like the sound of your modification that adds wires running from the alt to batt+. Maybe giving most of that current somewhere to go will help out my gage problems...

moparmat2000 said
Ok. Just an FYI, if your fuel gage and water temp gage ever are both pegging or going to empty/cold. Then the instrument voltage regulator is on the fritz. The gages you have run on 5V except the ammeter and speedometer. They use a little vibrating points regulator on the back the gage cluster to drop 12v to 5v if it sticks closed they peg, if it sticks open they drop to empty or cold.

I would use a point n shoot digital thermometer to see if the engine is getting too hot. Its a possibility the sending unit for the gage is bad, pegging it out. The sender is on the front of the cylinder head, with a purple wire going to it. The water temp sender is dirt cheap, i think the same part number was used up thru the 90s on chrysler 2.2 and 2.5 4 cylinder and 3.0 V6 engines.

Good to know. I'll pay closer attention to how the gages move next time I start up. I thought about getting a temp gun for the motor. What temp is too hot for the outside of the block to be?

I also thought about that sending unit, I'll probably just replace it because its so easy and cheap.