What happened??

[Dino]

On Saturday I drove the Charger to work and when I left for home around 4:30 I forgot there was a football game in town that had just ended.  I got stuck in traffic so had to take a bunch of backroads to get closer to home but still got stuck on one of the main roads.  We were slowly shuffling to a 4 way stop when all of a sudden the car died.  My fuel gauge needs calibrating but when I looked at the odometer I only put 100 miles on it since last fill up.  I couldn't get it to start so I assumed that being stuck in traffic for so long had emptied the tank.  I called my wife and asked her to bring the 2 gas cans that are filled with regular for the garden toys.  She came over, I poured them in and still nothing, it wasn't the gas after all....

While my wife blocked traffic on a road that was by now clear, I opened the hood and looked around.  I had two spare ballast resistors so I changed it out but still nothing, wasn't the resistor either... damn...

That day I did notice a funny sound when accelerating so I checked the linkage and noticed the rear spring on the throttle was barely hanging on.  I put it back, wiggled the electrical on the firewall and low and behold, it fired right up!  By that time we had a tow truck on the way so I called Hagerty to cancel it and drove home.  Here's the best part...the car never ran this good, it was like driving a new car.  Not that all of a sudden it had more power but everything went so much smoother than usual although I never had any problems with the gas before.

What the heck happened?  Did the spring coming off mess up the wiring?  Did it yank one of the bulkhead connectors?  I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary but this past summer, right after I fixed the header and had to remove most of the electrical on that side, I did break down once just before I reached my driveway.  Back then it didn't do anything, like the battery was dead.  Turned out the bulkhead connector wasn't tight enough so I clicked it back into place and the problem was solved.  Time for a new connector?

I drove it around a bit yesterday to make sure everything was alright and this morning I decided to drive it to work.  It started up easier than it usually does in the cold and drove fine.  I have no clue what happened but now I'm a bit nervous.

Since I need to install the TQ I'm not going to mess with the linkage right now but I guess it needs a bit of tlc.

[Ghoste]

That electrical stuff can be a real demon, it has to be kept clean and tight.

[Mytur Binsdirti]

True, but it's a 40+ year old car and unfortunately, one has to get used stuff like that happening.

[Dino]

When I worked on the header I removed all three bulkhead connectors and they were packed with grease.  I do think that everything was fine until I disturbed it.  I need to make this priority as I don't want to lose my car to an electrical fire.

[chargerboy69]

I had that problem for a couple years with my black 69.  Turned out it was a corroded wire in the bulkhead which left me stranded more than a few times.  It was not consistent and was hard to track down.  I could give it a little wiggle and the car would fire right up.

[triple_green]

My vote too for a corroded or sloppy bulkhead connector. Tortured me for a while.

[bakerhillpins]

How do you know it was electrical and not the return spring? This isn't really going to help you now but when trouble shooting I typically like to change one thing at a time. Then you have some marginal certainty of the effect that it had.

Glad you got it running again. My 69 doesn't like to start after it has run for over an hour and sits for more than say 30min. It took LOTS of cranking to get it running at the Sandwich Fair (1.5 hr drive there) and sat for the morning. Then it runs fine after that. If I left it overnight it's all good again   Needs a carb rebuild which I didn't get to cuz I stupidly looked at the brakes... and so on, and so on. 

[Dino]

How do you know it was electrical and not the return spring? This isn't really going to help you now but when trouble shooting I typically like to change one thing at a time. Then you have some marginal certainty of the effect that it had.

Glad you got it running again. My 69 doesn't like to start after it has run for over an hour and sits for more than say 30min. It took LOTS of cranking to get it running at the Sandwich Fair (1.5 hr drive there) and sat for the morning. Then it runs fine after that. If I left it overnight it's all good again   Needs a carb rebuild which I didn't get to cuz I stupidly looked at the brakes... and so on, and so on. 

I can disconnect all the linkage from the carb and it will still fire up fine, the gas pedal won't do much but it won't keep it from running.  When all is well and I remove that spring, all it does is raise the rpm a bit.  I do agree 100% about keeping the variables limited.   

I used to have hot start issues before I blocked the cross over but even then it would only take about 5 seconds before it fired back up.  I wonder what's wrong with yours.  Is the carb setup is that bad should it not run bad as well?

How well the car runs is all academic if it doesn't stop as it should so I wouldn't be too hard on yourself. 

[bakerhillpins]

Yes, but is the engine as warm as it was when you had the problem or did you pull the spring in the driveway? I guess I am just saying try to replicate the conditions as well as the mechanics. Drive around the block a few times and let it get all warm. Oh, did you ever check out your gas tank? I mean look to see if you have some sort of crap in it that might have made its way over to and plugged up the pickup? With all that stop and go you were talking about it might have sloshed up some crap just enough to move it and clog up the works. 

My carb is weird, it idles in the 2.5k region when it gets HOT in the summer (like close to overheating), the Idle speed jets are set WAY out from stock, will not run at stock settings. It's gotta be tired. Lots of stuff on the car is tired. On the plus side most of them look to be OEM!

I hear you on the stopping thing. It's just general frustration with life getting in the way and not having the time I *want* to spend on the car. In time that will change but right now it's in short supply. At least it runs and I can putter around locally. Doesn't help having it in storage 30min away either.

[70 Charger RT]

One thing you may want to do so you won't have any bulkhead issues in the future.  Remove each wire from both sides of the bulkhead connector and drill a wire size hole where the wire used to be.  Feed a new wire all the way through the bulkhead connector and splice onto the engine side wire to the interior wire.  You are escentially eliminating the terminal connection.  After you do all the wires that pass through the bulkhead, tape up the group of wires together and no one (except you) will know the difference.

[Dino]

One thing you may want to do so you won't have any bulkhead issues in the future.  Remove each wire from both sides of the bulkhead connector and drill a wire size hole where the wire used to be.  Feed a new wire all the way through the bulkhead connector and splice onto the engine side wire to the interior wire.  You are escentially eliminating the terminal connection.  After you do all the wires that pass through the bulkhead, tape up the group of wires together and no one (except you) will know the difference.

I was thinking about doing something like that and I do believe it's a smart move.

[mpdlawdog]

I was at that game!  Sorry I didnt see you or I would have stopped and pulled you home!!

[Dino]

I was at that game!  Sorry I didnt see you or I would have stopped and pulled you home!!

Much appreciated!   

I did get a few people stopping and asking if I needed help whcih was very nice of them.

[rebby]

One thing you may want to do so you won't have any bulkhead issues in the future.  Remove each wire from both sides of the bulkhead connector and drill a wire size hole where the wire used to be.  Feed a new wire all the way through the bulkhead connector and splice onto the engine side wire to the interior wire.  You are escentially eliminating the terminal connection.  After you do all the wires that pass through the bulkhead, tape up the group of wires together and no one (except you) will know the difference.

I will most likely do that on my GL build. Bulkhead connectors are great when you're swapping out an entire harness or pulling your dash, no so much when you're having intermittent issues. I'm actually skipping the bulkhead completely on my other car. Every wire will be a homerun to the fuse panel.

[Cooter]

One way around the older connector I've found is next time your at the junkyard and see some newer cars, grab a half dozen Weather pack connectors from the newer cars with the same amount of wires as your car has. Be sure to cut them out of the harnesses to where you have wires on each side of the connector and splice into your car.

[hatersaurusrex]

One way around the older connector I've found is next time your at the junkyard and see some newer cars, grab a half dozen Weather pack connectors from the newer cars with the same amount of wires as your car has. Be sure to cut them out of the harnesses to where you have wires on each side of the connector and splice into your car.

...and listen to how your wiring isn't 'correct' from douchebags

Would upgrading the bulkhead connector qualify a car as a restomod?

[Cooter]

One way around the older connector I've found is next time your at the junkyard and see some newer cars, grab a half dozen Weather pack connectors from the newer cars with the same amount of wires as your car has. Be sure to cut them out of the harnesses to where you have wires on each side of the connector and splice into your car.

...and listen to how your wiring isn't 'correct' from douchebags

Would upgrading the bulkhead connector qualify a car as a restomod?

Well, one might be able to run the wires through under the dash, then splice, but alot harder splicing under dash. Only a restomod if big wheels are installed at same time wiring is upgraded.

[Back N Black]

Buy a new dash and engine harness, money well spent.

[Dino]

Buy a new dash and engine harness, money well spent.

I don't know if I want to do that.  This only happened because I started fiddling with the connectors, the wring is really in very nice shape.  The car has been taken care of over the years and so far all the wiring I've seen was in really nice shape.  It would be a shame to remove something original that is still good.  After making sure the connectors were in place everything is working fine again, this is the 4 th day I'm driving it after breaking down and she's behaving just fine.

Now if wiring degrades over time and it needs to be replaced even if it looks fine then sure I will do so, but is that the case?  I didn't think copper wires would degrade enough to become a hazzard.

[Cooter]

It's not nessesarily the cooper wires Dino...It's mainly Poor connections causing HEAT that starts everybody going down that "Oh goodness, better replace the entire wiring harness at a cost of $2K, then complain about how much wiring harnesses cost" route. one other thing to remember is old insulation Tends to Crack when bent, therefore causing bare spots.

[Dino]

It's not nessesarily the cooper wires Dino...It's mainly Poor connections causing HEAT that starts everybody going down that "Oh goodness, better replace the entire wiring harness at a cost of $2K, then complain about how much wiring harnesses cost" route. one other thing to remember is old insulation Tends to Crack when bent, therefore causing bare spots.

Ok that makes sense.

I guess I will check the wiring then and test a few wires for brittleness (that a word ?)

If the car needs a new harness then so be it, I'm not against it, but I don't want to waste something good either.