So, like I said in the Work Chat thread; there is a group of people who're not required to be at work 5-days/week. And coincidentally, they are usually not there on the nice days; or really bad days either. So my crew abandoned me after 3PM. My Director had his office door closed all day; so at 4:30PM, I cut out and boogied home. Had 20 minutes of sunlight to get some work done on the Crown Vic. I managed to cut off the 2-pin Deutsch connector that I cold soldered; and replaced it with the single-pin Deutsch connector with the silver flux core solder that I should have used in the first place. Aside from the connector; the whole run is 8AWG cable; which replaced the OE 14AWG wire. I added some extra length to run down the fender and around the front of the battery to the negative post. I'm trying to keep wires and such from floating in the air like Ford originally had it.

When I was done with that, I took my upper control arms down from the garage frame; where they had been hanging to dry from last night's painting session. I'm stuck on deciding whether to clean and strip the spindles down and paint them; or just get another pair from the junkyard and start from scratch. I'm also leaning on getting new lower control arms with brand new ball joints already mounted. I could probably get away with what I got because they are relatively low-mileage; but I kinda like the idea of starting fresh. I gotta think about this.

 

So I am making a tentative time/date of late April to do the full exhaust swap on the '05 Grand Marquis. Only thing left to purchase is the EGR system; as the existing one will not budge. That will help clear out the basement of boxes and piping that is just hanging around down there.

I have a house project this month that will take up a bit of time; but I will try to get some work done on the Crown Vic as well.

 

This weekend, I plan on getting out in the back and hooking up the battery charger to the Crown Vic. Hopefully I can do that tomorrow and see what has power on Sunday. If it's just an issue with starting the car with the key; I'll just bypass that and install a starter button on the dash. I had planned to do this back in the day when the car was still being used for daily driving duty. My Dad shot that down because he thought that would be a problem with the auto inspection. Now since the car doesn't get inspected; I don't have to worry about that.

 

Last weekend I got a little time with this car. I looked to confirm that the known grounds are connected. There were 2 grounds that had ring terminals; those I had connected to the rear of the cylinder heads; with a copper strap going down from there to the engine block. My battery to core support ground is hooked up. The ECM ground was replaced last month. Those are the only ground connections that I know of; aside from the added accessories.

So when I turned the key I had dash lights and all that; but my fuel pump no longer runs. I had it running late last year before the original ECM ground connector failed. I will test the new ECM ground connector next month; after I get done with a house project. Also can't engage the starter with the key (still a problem). I think what I will do next month is confirm that my mass air wiring is correct; and go from there. That is the plan for the Crown Vic.

My Grand Marquis will have to wait until May for its full exhaust swap. One of my house projects got delayed a bit.

 

Why would you run a ground from the head to the block? I don't get that. I'd run a ground from the head to the firewall or from the block to the frame. I don't understand the logic here, but I've had a couple of brain surgeries and am pretty much a dumbass nowadays.

 

No brain surgeries here; but I still manage to not be the brightest bulb in the pack. As such, the two aforementioned grounds were bolted to the E6 heads on the 5.0. Since I deviated from the original plan and got aftermarket aluminum heads; I figured I would bolt those grounds in the original location (back of the heads) and run a copper strap to the iron block; since in my mind, aluminum isn't the best conductor. But I'm not an electrician; so I could be way off base on that assumption.

 

I can sort of see why you might do that If the head was the original cast iron. Can't say I envision a bunch of stuff bolted to the cylinder head or too many sensors requiring a true ground as the reference, but that would be my guess as to why the original head would have been tied to the block with a ground strap, and then on to the frame. Logic being you want everything at the same potential with respect to voltage and for the sensors, you need the difference between the sensing wire and its reference, in this case ground, to be stable in order to get valid readings. Although I would think the original head bolts holding the cylinder head to the block would be sufficient to take care of that, Ford must have found that not to be the case.

In conclusion, I really have no idea what I'm talking about with respect to your vehicle. Cuz I can't see it. Just trying to explain possible electrical reasons they may have done what they did.

With respect to your starter not spinning, it would seem that you either get a 12 volt DC reading patched through an old-fashioned starter relay or mechanical solenoid which on older vehicles was usually not an integral part of the starter itself. You may be able to solve this by tracing the wire from the ignition switch that closes this starter relay. If you get voltage from the ignition switch in the crank position but the relay does not close and pass the large current at 12 volts to the starter, then I would suspect the starter relay.

If you get no voltage on the wire from the ignition switch to the starter solenoid/relay with the key in crank, then it seems it would be either a wiring issue or an ignition switch issue.

I may be generalizing way too much on the way older vehicles were put together, especially Fords.
So please take the above with a grain of salt if I am off in an alternate universe compared to your vehicle. I just know that this has been drilling sideways into your brain for quite some time, so I am completely speculating concerning possible reasons for the problem. I don't know the car and I don't know the setup. It's all generalized advice and is possibly 100% wrong. But it is in good faith.

 

Ford had the grounds bolted directly to the iron heads; no strap. I installed the strap because I am running aluminum heads. As I said before; there is no reason other than I was told that aluminum isn't the best conductor. That's why I added the copper straps.

Yah; I am going through my EVTM manual to see which wire is the ECM power; and which wire runs to the neutral safety switch. I know there are a bunch of fusible links; so I will ID those wires and see if power is running through them. Then go from there. There are a bunch of Fox body Mustang wiring diagrams on Google; I just don't know if Ford used the same colored wires for the Crown Vic as well. Oh, the starter solenoid is on the fender; most everything runs off of that.

 

Looks like the insulation is coming off that top right black wire just above the yellow with the green stripe, Chickenbone. I doubt that's an issue right now, but it could be in the future.

 

That's the starter signal wire. I shoved the wire way up into that terminal until it protruded into the ring terminal; then pulled it back a little. I put heat shrinking over the plastic collar as my crimping tool makes awesome crimps; but mangles the plastic collars.

I got home this afternoon with some time to spare. So I went to work replacing the brake light switch. I had forgotten how much of a pain it is to remove from the brake pedal knub. I managed to lose the nylon washer that goes between the booster hoop and brake pedal switch mount. I hope this doesn't kill it quickly. I was trying to jam it back into the brake switch mount and through the brake pedal knub. Freakin thing shot off somewhere under the dash. I'll deal with that later.

Still had some light; so I ID'd the ECM power wire and tested it behind the fuses; the test light lit up both times; so at least power is making it out that far. I noticed my new ECM ground connector kind of rattles. And my solder joint is bent. Since I revamped the 2-pin Deutsch connector; I'm going to test the new connector; and if it fails; I will replace it with the 2-pin connector. Hopefully that will solve some of the ECM woes; or get me closer to solving the problem(s).

Whilst following the ECM power wires to the firewall; I found a severed Yellow w/red stripe wire among the other wires in the same harness. I am scouring my EVTM to ID it.