Can a 92 Ford IDI wiring harness work with a 12V 5.9?

[Lonesome7.3]

I am slowly accumulating all the parts I require to drop a 6BT 12V into a 96 F350 chassis I have. I my goal is to use as many factory Ford parts as possible. I would also like for the factory cruise control to work as well as a few other factory options. A friend of mine has I think a 92 Ford parts truck with a 7.3 IDI. The wiring appears to be mostly intact and I have access to it if it will work. Has anyone else tried this? Being since the IDI’s were not electronically controlled and neither is my 5.9 in my way of thinking it should be a somewhat “simple” task. Any thought?

 

[Agnem]

It should. I assume the Cummins you are looking at is a "one wire" motor. Should be a simple matter of just matching up the sensors and IP wire with what we normally have. Naturally you will have to come up with some other system for controlling the glow plugs or whatever those things have. If the cruise control mechanical cable can be adapted to the throttle lever of the pump on your transplant, then that will be good to go as well. The lenght of the cable can be adjusted by swapping it out for a cable for a different motor. In other words, when I did my gas to diesel conversion, I kept the cruise servo, but swapped the cable for the EFI 302 motor for one from a diesel, simply because the gas cable was too short. All trucks of whatever year had the same servo. They just changed the cable depending on the lenght needed.

 

[Lonesome7.3]

Thanks, that helped me a lot. Now, what kind of sensors will I have to deal with? I am thinking stuff like temp, oil pressure, and so on. If so, I was planning on building a new gauge cluster with after market gauges.

 

[MIDNIGHT RIDER]

I can't speak for your 1992/1996, but it should not differ much from my 1985.


Nothing on the Ford "wiring harness" is going to plug-and-play on any Cummins engine.

You are going to have to do a little re-wiring.

This is no reason to cry, go into a panic, and get ulcers.

Ford's wiring ain't that great anyhow; you can do bigger and better.

If you use the 120-amp Cummins/Nippon-Denso alternator, you can leave it as is where is, but a wee bit of re-wiring will be necessary to tie it to the Ford EXTERNAL voltage regulator.

Or, you can build a new bracket that mounts the Ford alternator onto the Cummins engine; swap the Ford alternator-pulley for the one that is on the ND alternator; they are the same bore.



As for the gauges, remove all the Ford gauge-senders from the Ford engine.

Remove the matching gauge-senders from the Cummins engine.

The Ford senders are all of a smaller NPT size than the Cummins senders, some being 3/8-NPT, some 1/2-NPT, and some 3/4-NPT; use plain old pipe adapter-bushings to put the Ford senders into the Cummins sender holes.


Keep the questions coming; I can go on and on for enough to write a book on this ----- maybe I should quit posting and get started on that book; I could get rich.

 

[MIDNIGHT RIDER]

Oh yeah, FORGET THE INTAKE GRID-HEATERS; they are absolutely un-necessary and only serve to kill good batteries.

Ford and GM being much earlier with consumer-grade diesel pick-ups, and them both always being IDIs requiring glow-plugs to start, and having the "WAIT-TO-START" light, it somehow got burned into people's brains that, just because the Dodge/Cummins also has a "WAIT-TO-START" light, that they must always wait to start.

All that light waiting business is for is emissions,whatever that is; it's nothing we need concern ourselves with; we got men hired in Washington to worry about that stuff.

A cold Cummins will fire quicker than you can let go of the key, WITHOUT waiting on that light.

The only beneficial thing about the Cummins INTAKE grid-heaters are those two super-heavy-duty solenoid-relays that can be put to better use controlling some big heavy-amp electrical accessory.

 

[FordGuy100]

I was thinking the same thing. Plugs wont work, but cutting off the ford ends and wiring it up to fit onto the cummins ends would work fine.

Did you flip your exhaust manifold over to help get the turbo away from the A/C box?

 

[Lonesome7.3]

I did not know about flipping the manifold. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[MIDNIGHT RIDER]

I did not know about flipping the manifold. Thanks for the heads up.

Flipping the Dodge manifold will not help the A/C box issue; done been all over that.

Read the other thread where it is now being discussed.

 

[MIDNIGHT RIDER]

>>> FUEL FILTER <<<

As issued, the Dodge/Cummins comes with a very problematic open-bottom fuel-filter that has a removable plastic drain-valve with electrical probes.

That filter is pitifully small and the first molecule of dirt that comes along will stop it up tight.

Plus, the "Water-in-Fuel" probes get all bent out of shape and the wimpy wires soon short into each other.

Un-plug that silly WIF plug and zip-tie it back out of the way.

Spin off that wimpy filter and throw it as far out in the pond as your arm can send it; leave that silly bottom valve attached to the filter; good riddance.


Avail yourself of a dozen or so FleetGuard FS1221 water-separating fuel-filters or their equivalent.

These have an integral METAL drain-valve and are about three-times the capacity of the stock unit.

 

[Darrin Tosh]

Midnight Rider knows his stuff! Mel aint no dummy either,..

I used the factory wiring as well for the gauges, and to power the pump. It does take some splicing and extending of the wires. All of my factory gauges work (save for the tac) and I also piggy backed them with aftermarket gauges. You just have to find the correct wire for the Oil, Sender, Temp Sender etc and install the factory ford Senders like was stated above and hook it up. However if you are just building a whole aftermarket cluster then you would not use much of the factory wiring at all.

Gonna be starting a swap all over again on Droopy in the next week or so.

 

[MIDNIGHT RIDER]

>>> FUEL HEATER DELETE <<<

Immediately above the fuel-filter is a fuel-heater; absolutely useless and un-necessary; notorious for leaking fuel.

When you spin off a fuel-filter, the heater will slightly turn on it's stud; when you spin on the new filter, the heater will turn the opposite direction.

You will fire up the truck to test for leaks and you will see fuel drip --- drip --- drip off the bottom of the filter.

Naturally, you will assume that something is amiss with your filter mounting method.

You will screw off the new filter, inspect that there was indeed an O-ring seal on it, check the mounting base to assure there was no errant extra O-ring on there, lube the new O-ring and re-install the filter.


The drip just got worse.


You will grab the filter-wrench and give it a healthy squeeze; still DRIP -- DRIP -- DRIP.


Squeeze some more; still dripping.


Finally, you will discover that there is indeed a CUMMINs only O-ring seal on top of that heater that can only be had from a Cummins store (or some concern that has gotten them from there).

You will spend money and wait for UPS to bring the new seal; you should have gotten two dozen; because, every time you mess with the fuel-filter, that seal is gonna get trashed again.


Oh yeah; oh yeah; there are some that are afixing to jump in here and claim "it has never happened to me" ; never mind, there day is coming and hopefully they remember reading this.



There IS a much better way.

Remove the fuel-filter.

Using whatever proper tool it takes, remove/un-screw the filter/heater mounting stud.

Un-plug the heater wires and zip-tie that plug back out of the way.

Throw the heater and all of them odd-ball O-ring seals way out in the pond; good riddance.


Avail yourself of a standard issue Cummins fuel-filter mounting stud that deletes the heater.

The filter will now seat against the upper surface where it was originally intended to do so.

Never again will you be on the side of the road replacing a filter and un-able to get it to quit leaking.

 

[alienturtle]

Flipping the Dodge manifold will not help the A/C box issue; done been all over that.

Read the other thread where it is now being discussed.

stock dodge manifold..flipped upside down..clears my ac box like a charm.

 

[FordGuy100]

Perhaps it won't clear a 83-86 AC box but the bricknoses on up?

 

[Lonesome7.3]

I sure do appreciate the information so far. I have no idea what I am getting into. So any and all information is welcome.

 

[MIDNIGHT RIDER]

Midnight Rider knows his stuff! Mel aint no dummy either,..

My gosh; I feel like I have finally arrived.

Coming from someone such as yourself, I take that as a genuine compliment !!!


I am gonna have the wife to copy that, enlarge it, and hang it on the wall.


Carry on.