24v swap wiring harness question

frankie591 · 03-02-2012, 08:27 AM

Hey everyone, I'm in the middle of swapping an obd1 m52 into my e30, and have heard that the wiring harness from an e36 m50 is longer than the wiring harness from an e34 m50. I want to find out what car my harness came from because if its from an e34 I want to extend the harness to make sure I can reach the stock ecu mounting point. Does anybody know the lengths of these 2 harnesses so I can measure and find out which one I have?

El Gato Liso · 03-02-2012, 09:50 AM

i used the e34 harness...the ecu is flopping around in the glove box, but it is plenty long. a lot of the stuff you read on the swap was not particularly true...at least what I noticed :p

you dont need to extend anything

frankie591 · 03-02-2012, 09:59 AM

Thanks for the help, and ya I'm learning that there's a lot of people who bitch about how hard elements of the swap are when they turn out to be rather simple. Good to know that my harness will work as is

matty.dc · 03-02-2012, 08:18 PM

The swap can be done while sleeping haha. Everybody makes it sounds so complicated. Easy as pie!

frankie591 · 03-02-2012, 09:15 PM

Ya pretty much all that's needed is money, a little time and the ability to read forums haha. Emphasis on the money part tho as i'm finding out

MaxBell · 03-03-2012, 01:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by frankie591

...the ability to read forums haha.

Yeh, between R3VLimited.com and a couple other sites, there's really no question unanswered.

matty.dc · 03-03-2012, 12:41 PM

The only difference in connecting the two harnesses may depend on the year of your e30. My tach wire was in my glove box which may not be the case in most e30's

El Gato Liso · 03-03-2012, 01:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by matty.dc

The only difference in connecting the two harnesses may depend on the year of your e30. My tach wire was in my glove box which may not be the case in most e30's

you know, the tach is the only thing i couldnt get working on my swap....then again, it never worked pre-swap either...

SamE30e · 03-03-2012, 05:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by frankie591

Hey everyone, I'm in the middle of swapping an obd1 m52 into my e30, and have heard that the wiring harness from an e36 m50 is longer than the wiring harness from an e34 m50. I want to find out what car my harness came from because if its from an e34 I want to extend the harness to make sure I can reach the stock ecu mounting point. Does anybody know the lengths of these 2 harnesses so I can measure and find out which one I have?

You don't need to extend or shorten either. You end up with a bit of extra worst case. But get a late model 318i ecu bracket. looks cleaner.

matty.dc · 03-03-2012, 07:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SamE30e

You don't need to extend or shorten either. You end up with a bit of extra worst case. But get a late model 318i ecu bracket. looks cleaner.

I just zip tied mine to the existing ecu bracket and covered it with the stock plastic piece. You cant see anything. Looks just like stock.

frankie591 · 03-03-2012, 08:04 PM

Ya i'll either fab my own bracket or just zip tie it up. I think all together those 3 brackets cost something like 50-75 bucks. If there were any e30's in yards around here that I could scavenge from it would be a different story, but yards here suck