Repro light harness and HL socket?

RTC1930

RTC1930

Senior Member
I purchased a light harness from one of the big vendors 10 years ago along with a bunch of other parts. Fast forward 10 years and i'm finally getting around to restoring but have had to repurchase almost every item bought from this vender due to quality issues. Now im up to the light harness and I see numerous comments regarding the fit and function repro switch parts. What exactly are the issues with the harness and switch plate. All the other switch parts in the steering column are original and I still have the original plate. Should I put the new wires on the original plate? I'm going to try fitting it today but just curious what I'm in for.

I also heard the HL socket repros were junk too so should I not even waste my money. Bulb portion is there but the harness socket is missing. I could twist the new harness in with wire nuts like in Les Andrews book. Or are these sockets workable/reparable.

Wish I had Fordbarn 10 years ago. Would have saved so much time and money.

Thanks,
Bob NJ
 
The main problem with the harness from most vendors is the contacts are too long, which overcompress the spring causing a short. Or atleast this is my understanding from past post and some time spent in the shop looking over what I have. I ordered mine from Berts along with the insulators. It appears the new insulators are alittle deeper than original to compensate for the longer contact ends. Rod
 
one big problem is the repro switches have poor contacts that do not snap into position firmly. If you use the original, you're much better off. The repro contact plates seem to work OK in original switches, but if you can pull the wires off the one you have and install them on an original plate you will be much happier. Many repro harnesses have crimped fittings only at the wire ends. They should be soldered to the wires or they will fail eventually from corrosion between the wires and the crimp. Some repro plates are soldered to the wires, making a switch to the originals very difficult. The harness ends that contact the headlight socket contacts on the older repros are usually rounded and as mentioned above, the springs are too long and they bend over and short out when installed. You can get the flat brass ends that are correct and attach them to the harness so they will fit an original socket. The repro headlight sockets at the bucket are miserably bad. In most cases bypassing them and using wire nuts to connect the harness wires directly to the bulb socket pigtails will work better. I just installed a new set up on a sport coupe and the contacts at the bucket all worked fine (a first for me), so maybe the manufacturers are finally getting it better, but if your harness is older, be prepared to de-bug it at every contact point..
 
I heard that Sacremento Vintage Ford has their own wire harness making machine, and to my knowledge they are the only ones making the correct harness for fluted headlights (1928-early 1929). I bought 2 from them and soldered them to my original switch plates. No repro switch plates are made for the fluted headlights.

I would call them and see if they also make the Twolight harness without the switch plate, so it's easier to install an original plate.
 
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