A real "RATROD"

[alex g]

looks awesome, love the period switches, copper piping and so on.

the mdf fuse board? i guess it non conductive just not real heat/fire friendly

but slick work, like it

[GoLfMan]

top notch, a REAL cool rat.

I tell you what though, that slammed white kings is farkin AWESOME

[16v_kid]

First of all LOVE THE GEAR SHIFT!!!

Second... nice work on the wiring and the fuel lines is a nice touch.

Good stuff Tim.

[Oneofthegreats]

looks awesome, love the period switches, copper piping and so on.

the mdf fuse board? i guess it non conductive just not real heat/fire friendly

but slick work, like it

It may look alittle dodgey to some, but you should take a peek at what some big dollar hotrods & such are wired like. They are terrible & have paid through the roof for it too!

This was a fairly basic wiring job although very time consuming. The car only has Ignition, headlights, taillights, brake lights, airbags & thermo's.
Only the lighting system is fused. The rest is wired though circuit breaker's which are more reliable than fuses & if they do trip, the cut back in, in a few minutes. Whereas a fuse will blow & thats it. No more power. You have to change it.

I've done several of wiring jobs where I'd had to start from scratch like the ratter & below & its much easier to mount everything to a board, make up all the majority of the wiring harness & then fit it all in one go. You can also fit a "Mains" power & earth supply without having to isolate it all from the body.




My friend who also does this sort of thing as his job also does his wiring nearly identical & he's done some very big dollar show cars that have graced a few major mags & has never had any drama's with heat or short outs etc.

Its also very easy to mount to the body & reuse some of the original bolts/body mountings without having to mount several relay's, circuit breaks, fuses & drilling 10+ holes into the body!

My friend also didn't want any extra visible holes anywhere either which made it even better to use this. It only has 2 screw's holding it all in through some standard holes.


So it all works fine. I'll be doing a similar thing with my truck wiring too!

[Oneofthegreats]

top notch, a REAL cool rat.

I tell you what though, that slammed white kings is farkin AWESOME

That was his father in law's which he brought from brand new. Drives like new even dropped that low.

Engine has done bugger all km's & coupled to the original & still sweet as shifting auto, it definitely is a cruiser!

The only addition is the sunvisor (as he loved my old ute), stocky rims & whitewalls & rear venetian!

Cool as!

Can't get enough of the old stuff. Much more reliable than....(I won't say it, but I'm sure most of you all know what I mean!)

[Peter Jones]

I've wired a few similar things (and a lot of very dissimilar things )

The '56 Inter I re-wired only had about a dozen wires and they all ran back to a thermal trip out that is part of the headlight switch.

If you're looking for something other than MDF to work with try a nylon chopping board. You know, the kitchen kind! You can buy pretty big ones cheap and they machine well so you can tap, drill, saw, recess etc neatly with the same tools you're using for the MDF. You can even make a laminated switchboard so that there's no chance of shorts from behind. They'll take a bit of heat too.

If you're really nuts and have a lot of time on your hands you can use a router to conceal wiring in behind the board.

You can also buy the nylon chopping board material from an industrial plastic suppliers along with lots of other cool stuff. K-Mart is pretty cheap to just get a big chopping board from though.

For a Rat Rod I'd probably use old fabric covered mains leads for the exposed wiring. The sort of thing you find on old toasters, kettles, irons etc. The mid section of the lead is usually OK you just have to know how to bind off the ends of the fabric sheath properly and how to terminate according to the conductor type. (Anyone here ever worked with tinsel wire?)

I have another technique in mind for a special project one day, brass wire bus bars! Has to be an early car with only a small amount of wiring and firmly mounted terminations but I reckon I could pull it off.

Just wish I had more time.

Pete

[Peter Jones]

I remember seeing a similar rat rod back in 2006 at the Cranbourne event.

Didn't get many shots of it. Do remember that it had an LPG exhaust flamer kit on it though

Gotta love the barbed wire spider web grill!



Pete

[Oneofthegreats]

The original plan was to use the fabric wiring as you suggested Pete funnily enough, but we couldn't get it in time or enough of it either

Ah well. He's more happier that its done like this & is as hidden as it can be.


But I'll be rewiring his BSA motorbike with the old fabric wiring!

Nice suggestion about the boards material too! I'll be keeping it in mind!

I think there is alittle too much wiring to route through the boards with routed channels. Its a nice idea, but hard as buggery when you have to chase a problem or rewire it I think.

For interest sake, I counter sink the power/earth supply bolts & cover them in silicon to avoid short outs etc.


This board tucks up under the cowl & is unnoticeable as everything is on the top side of the board, but still has access to the vitals being relay's & fuses etc. That's why there mounted on the edge of the board. Its also labeled underneath too!

I reckon the best bit about fabricating a project like this is that no one will ever own one like it & he's the only one with it!

[Peter Jones]

Finishing off fabric coated wire can be a bit fiddly if you haven't worked with it before.

In my experience you're best off trying to replicate the old termination practices and bind the end of the braid rather than use heatshrink.

Having said that though I reckon the type of heatshrink with the inner layer of hotmelt glue would probably do the trick. You've got to stop the braid from sliding back up the wire.

I'd probably try a few different techniques and see what works best.

A transformer winding place might be able to find you some waxed lacing twine if you're trying to be period otherwise I'd try binding with cotton and a drop of super glue.

I like wires!

Pete

[Preen59]

You guys have got more heart than me. I'm no good with electrical stuff.. At all.