Centech Harness my $.02

I do recommend them alot, due to price.

its the best bang for the buck in the current harness offering, its a basic harness that get the job done, if you have a somewhat stock bronco.
start adding accessories and custom gauges look elsewhere.
other offerings are:

Ron Francis - I like this harness , good price and handles addons, draw back is finding a place to mount the fuse box. Don't use the lawnmower ign switch use the bronco stock switch

AAW - never done one of these yet, wnat turn me off this harness is the connectors that you need to rent the crimpers for, i'm getting old instructions have small print.

Painless - cost is up there on this one, I like the Ford colors, everyone else uses chevy, Harness was well thought out, instructions are good.




In the process of installing one now, splicing, scotch locks, twisting & wrapping wires with black tape and rusty panels don't conduct electrically forever.
I'm gonna take some of this part back... they have improved a little, rear harness has been changed at the rear lights a ground wires and stock plugs have been added, if the stock stuff is in good shape this is just a plug in.

I'm pretty sure Centech has not installed one of their harness in awhile to test fit at least in this decade.

here are my bitches:

Glove box template as noted on paper: "inside glove box" how the hell are you gonna mark , drill & cut from inside the glove box.

pretty sure the template does not match the fuse box, I drilled with the template taped to the glove box and when I went to install the screws had to re drill the top hole.

Installing pointy screws to secure the fuse box to the glove box leaving pointy screws almost stabbing the wires on the backside.

How about an extra ground wire for the radio, I guess they expect the radio ground to just stack up on the dash screw.

heater wire should exit out of the wiper bundle vs ign switch bundle.

This harness was ordered with the stock switch connector vs the adapter connector , all it is is the adapter included in the package.

Harness is wrapped in electrical tape....this is 2018 !! tape has advance in the last 50 years...get some harness tape on it.

TBC

pointy screws:

dual exhaust is so cool..

IMO not enough room under a Bronco to install one.

I think this is a ground wire or a snake.

ransil said:

I think this is a ground wire or a snake.

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Haha, I crawled under there, saw that and yelled up to you "wtf is this"?

I just finished mine up tonight and was super happy with it. I have absolutely zero experience with harnesses and not much with electrical at all. I will say, there instructions were kinda all over the place. They would have two or three important steps all in step 5 for example. Hell they even had a few sentences that weren't complete. I thought to myself, "I hope that step wasn't important"! haha

As for the glove box template, it's meant to be mounted to the outside of the box. I taped mine, traced around it and marked holes with a pilot bit.

I am in the middle of installing one also and yeah the directions are all over the place kinda leave you hanging in some areas. What is up with the wiring loom that is 4 times the size of the wires in the loom I tore all that crap off and used the painless wrap that is nylon type wrap loom that looks and protects better in my opinion. The harness for the coolant and oil sending unit comes out off the passenger side harness wth is up with that they are on the drivers side of the engine. But overall a good harness.

Yeah, I thought that was kinda strange too... I used the braided sheathing on all of my wires. It really cleans the engine bay up!

When you get to the passenger side, the white (I-term) wire is toward the front of the engine bay and the violet (start) wire is toward the passenger firewall... The way I have my starter solenoid setup I wish those wires were reversed if that makes sense. My solenoid is mounted on the passenger inner fender. I think there's enough wire to re-route them. I had already put them in braid and put heat shrink on the ends... too lazy to redo it.... I'm ready to drive this whip! haha

Yeah I just taped the start wire in that loom towards the front it is long enough. I am running the late model starter and 3g alternator on this one.

I heard the Centech is easier on a custom dash layout than the painless. Is there enough wire to move things around, like the gauge cluster on the right side of the steering wheel?

Here's a picture of the back of my dash. If you remove the harness wrap (electrical tape), I bet you could. This is before I cleaned up the wiring and put my glove box on. Hopefully this pic will help...

ObscureMachine said:

I heard the Centech is easier on a custom dash layout than the painless. Is there enough wire to move things around, like the gauge cluster on the right side of the steering wheel?

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I would doubt that. Can't imagine that a pre-taped harness is in any way easier to customize than one that has all the wires loose, or semi-loose (wire ties) and extra length.
I would have to say that, while you can customize the Centech and there is enough wire for a few changes, the Painless and AAW harnesses are way easier to make a custom install from.

To your specific question about the cluster, I'd say there is no way to move the cluster to the other side of the wheel.
But the others have just installed theirs and would have a fresher outlook on that. Maybe they think different, but I say no.

Paul

DirtDonk said:

I would doubt that. Can't imagine that a pre-taped harness is in any way easier to customize than one that has all the wires loose, or semi-loose (wire ties) and extra length.
I would have to say that, while you can customize the Centech and there is enough wire for a few changes, the Painless and AAW harnesses are way easier to make a custom install from.

To your specific question about the cluster, I'd say there is no way to move the cluster to the other side of the wheel.
But the others have just installed theirs and would have a fresher outlook on that. Maybe they think different, but I say no.

Paul

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Hey Paul,
I'm going to be using the Dakota Digital VHX gauge cluster, and was wondering if that made a difference; does it have different leads or connections. I'm going to be doing a lot of custom wiring (custom dash) so maybe I should go with AAW?

Sorry for hijacking the thread! - jim

ObscureMachine said:

Hey Paul,
I'm going to be using the Dakota Digital VHX gauge cluster, and was wondering if that made a difference; does it have different leads or connections. I'm going to be doing a lot of custom wiring (custom dash) so maybe I should go with AAW?

Sorry for hijacking the thread! - jim

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I'm no expert by any means, but I would think if you are doing custom work, centech isn't the best option. It's a great deal for someone staying relatively close to stock though.

Agreed. It's almost too nice to cut up totally too. But I suppose as a less expensive harness, there is still something to be said for starting with the Centech, then just unwrapping it completely and "rolling your own" to suit.

But if it was me, I'd pay the extra for one of the others and start off in a better position.

ObscureMachine said:

I'm going to be using the Dakota Digital VHX gauge cluster, and was wondering if that made a difference; does it have different leads or connections.

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Makes a huge difference in one way. The DD dash has it's own wiring harness entirely, so not a single wire that I can think of from the harness is connected to the actual cluster.
But the Centech would still limit where you can mount the gauge controller I would think.
I like mounting them on the driver's kick panel, which might be out of reach for at least some of the Centech wires. But I bet if you were clever you could mount the controller up on the cowl towards the middle of the dash, or perhaps on the steering column itself maybe(?) and then have no trouble with the reach of the circuits.

ObscureMachine said:

I'm going to be doing a lot of custom wiring (custom dash) so maybe I should go with AAW?

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Definitely that or the Painless. Like has been said, I really like the Centech and it has a good bang for the buck. But it's not in the same vein as the other two. The AAW and Painless both have more blank circuits, better (weather resistance-wise) fuse panels, and I'd have to say a LOT more wire to work with.

There is more in the Painless kit, and theirs is the only one using Ford wiring colors, but is heavily into the stock stuff too, so has more of the factory type connectors and such.
The AAW might be the better match in your case.

Paul

ObscureMachine said:

I heard the Centech is easier on a custom dash layout than the painless. Is there enough wire to move things around, like the gauge cluster on the right side of the steering wheel?

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custom dash I would do the Ron francis harness.

This is how not to repair a floor when you have an Aux tank, 6 plus self tappers screwed into the top of the Aux tank, took a pry bar to get to tank down.

Ran into this guy between the garage & house

Saw the skunk and thought you were referring to the quality of the floor repair;D

Don't forget about this guy from the rear tank

1971lubr said:

Don't forget about this guy from the rear tank

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Friend of mine did that.