Fusebox 1956 Chevy truck

[mike1954]

Is there a simple way to integrate a fusebox into the factory wiring harness?
I cannot see a good way with every thing powered off the ignition switch and headlight switch without using inline fuses to protect individual circuits.

[dsraven]

you can use relays to power the fuse box. the relays get energized by the ign switch when the switch gets turned to the on position. this in turn powers on the fuse box through the relay(s). same for the headlights. use a relay that gets energized to turn on when you turn the lights on. the headlight switch only passes a minimal amount of power that way so it will last way longer. same for the ign switch. the fuse box has it's own power supply(s) with heavy duty fuses or fusible links next to the battery. you can do the same for the heater motor as they also have quite a draw.

[Wrenchbender Ret]

I always install an auxillary fuse block & wire all the accesaries to like the turn signals, radio, & heater. You will only need 1 wire from the ign. switch to the block.

[mike1954]

Thanks for the responses. I suppose my biggest concern is the tail light, dash light circuit. The rest could be done through an auxiliary fuse box. I could do an inline on those circuits.

[dsraven]

if you are gonna put a fuse box in you might as well spend the time to do all the circuits in one box. it keeps it cleaner and also is easy to know what is where then. not that hard if you do a circuit at a time.use a fuse/relay box from something at picknpull to keep the costs down.

[my56chevytruck]

Originally Posted by dsraven

if you are gonna put a fuse box in you might as well spend the time to do all the circuits in one box. it keeps it cleaner and also is easy to know what is where then. not that hard if you do a circuit at a time.use a fuse/relay box from something at picknpull to keep the costs down.

I used an AAW wiring harness and mounted my fusebox under the dash. As dsraven said, then its all in one place, and easy to access.

[_Ogre]

if you are still using the stock switch, it has built in protection for all lighting circuits
there is a bimetal strip from the bat lug to points at ''A'' and ''B'' when there is an overload the bimetal strip heats up and opens the points
the ''A'' points protect the stop/turn and tail light circuits, ''B'' points protect the headlights
the small fuse ''C'' coming off the stop/turn and tail light circuit, is for the dash lights and feeds thru the dimmer rheostat

the bimetal strip is the same as what is used in a modern day auto-reset breaker that would be on a headlight circuit
in an overload situation the strip will heat and cool rapidly making the headlights flash
with a fuse on the headlights once overloaded it would kill the lights, not good on a mountain road
flashing lights give you enough light to safely pull over

heaters and radios were options at the time and either had inline fuses or a 4 fuse panel on electric wiper optioned vehicles
not much else needed protection in a basic vehicle like our trucks
the battery hookup has a spare lug to connect a small auxiliary fuse panel, but don't overload the wire
your truck should also have a fusible link at the battery to protect all circuits in case of a dead short to ground or a massive overload

the bend here reference is if your lights flash under normal load, without an overload situation
the bimetal strip can be tweaked to increase the resistance, be careful when tweaking or you lose the overload protection
and you will let the smoke out of the wires in an overload

[Roadkill58]

Ogre your timing is impeccable.

Guess what I was working on today?

.

[mike1954]

Thanks guys I appreciate the help

[Coupeguy2001]

You can even put the parking light wire on the tail light extra lug to have parking lights come on with the headlights. I did that way back when. Now I'm thinking of adding a relay off of the ignition switch to have daylight running lights like all the new cars.