1980 K100 Cabover Project/daily runner

It is a shame that a top tier truck company would sell trucks with litterally a rats nest wiring harness under the dash of their cabover trucks. Compare to a Pete or Freightliner from the same era, the difference is day and night.

 

I am not being sarcastic. I am speaking from experience. I was a fleet mechanic for Kooyman Trucking, house carrier for U S Steel Pittsburg. We had over 70 Freightliners, two K100 s, two 4070's and three Peterbilts. Every electrical problem with the KW's was compounded by the absolute rats nest of wiring under the dash. I repeat, look at the wiring harness of a Peterbilt or Freightliner of the same era before making further comment. Thank You

 

Been following this thread with interest, a lot of good info here... I'll add a little more to it, if I may:

• Make sure to grease all the zerks in the shifter linkage, some are hard to find and have usually been over-looked for years, to the point of having a wild shifter.
• When changing the oil, punch a hole in the bottom of the filter first and let it drain out before removing.
• When greasing the kingpins, jack up the axle to relieve the pressure, then grease it.
• When removing the wheels, loosen all the lug nuts just a little bit first, then roll a little bit to break them loose, thus saving you from having to beat them off with a sledge.
• When flushing the coolant/radiator, replace with distilled water/anti-freeze mix, and don't forget to change the coolant filter, keeps the little nasty's (minerals) from hammering through your cylinder sleeves.

 

Times 2 @clausland said. I still have my K100. Keep that shifter tower grease. Also what @51.50 said about the rats nest under the dash, so true. But I figured mine out after having it so long. I'm sure if I was to go inside it now, it would literally be a rats nest from being parked a few years.

 

Funny the wiring in the cab of my dad's classic xl scares me more than my k100 because at least KW used more than one color wire.

 

My K100 wiring did have the color and numbers on the wiring. If you have the book wiring schematics, it was super easy to chase it down and fine to what exactly breaker it would go to. I bought my K100 in 1984 and the truck itself is a 1979. I got use to it and figured the wiring out after all those years and organized it cleaned it up with zip ties etc where I could, but for new owner to open dash and see all that wiring, probably would freak out.

 

Make sure your harness is not rubbing down around the steering box. That can turn into a major issue.

 

Pete does the same thing with the wiring, problem is, over time, the colors fade & change and the #'s are hard to make out, couple that with the problems of old age and " I don't see so good up close anymore." Still fun to work on though....