Wiring issues on 89'

[JGoss]

I'm finally getting time to work on my 89' It's a 4x4, auto, and I have a few questions. I bought the truck awhile back and whoever worked on it should find a new job. The truck is pretty rough but mechanically good. I replaced the starter and starter relay because someone went around the bad relay and used a toggle switch to start the truck. It worked ok but I immediatley heard the starter not disengaging. The starter was toast and the flex plate is soon to follow. So after replacing these, I noticed a wire that I think goes to the battery. It's got a male and female factory plug on it. It's a black wire and the plug is about 4" long and real skinny. One of the jumper wires to the toggle switch was spliced to the female end. I threw all of jumper wires out and want it back how it's supposed to be. Does anyone have any pictures, or could tell me where the wire goes. The end is smashed down like it went under the battery terminal. It's right between the battery and inner fender. I have searched for schematics and on TDR with no luck. I'm going to buy either a service manual or chiltons this weekend. I'm busy in the fields today but will post some pictures this weekend if my description isn't clear. Thanks a lot.

 

[RedRamAndy]

Howdy J,

I have an '89. I just popped the hood and see a connector like you mention, but it has two wires in it. It has a red one hooked to the + terminal of the battery and a brown one that goes into the wiring loom to the starter on one side of the plug. The other side of the plug has the red and brown running into the main harness of the truck, to the starter relay I suppose. Hope this helps.

 

[JGoss]

Thanks for helping, but that isn't the plug I was talking about. Hear are some pics. It's the black wire with the blue tape around it.

 

[Philip]

That is the power feed from the alt. The other section show be there somewhere.

 

[JGoss]

Could you please give me a little more info about the other section. Where does it end up? Can I just put it on the positive terminal on the battery? The wire has to be on the positive to start the truck, but I took it off to see what it would do and the engine sort of idled down, maybe the alternator didn't have no juice?

 

[dodgenstein]

Originally the positive cable had 2 wires coming out of the battery terminal. The large one going to the starter, and the smaller one that you show that powers the rest of the truck. You will have to engineer a way to get this lead on the positive terminal. You may put a ring terminal over the battery bolt, like the grid heaters run off of, or get a new battery terminal and put both wires into it like the factory setup.

 

[PBJ2500CTD]

Do you have an ammeter or voltmeter? If you have an ammeter, does it work? I am not too familiar with the 80's Dodges. I know from much experience that the 70's had some major issues with the ammeter and associated wiring. If the ammeter quit, or the wiring toasted, the truck would not run, or charge. There was a simple re-wire to remove the deffective ammeter from the circuit to allow use of a voltmeter. Just wondering if this backyard "fix" was carried over to the 80's trucks.
Here is a link to some good info: Catalog

 

[JGoss]

I wired it to the postive battery terminal and so far so good. Thanks for the help.