has anyone replaced the woefully inadequate fuse blocks that came on our cars with a modern blade-fuse block? if so, pics and part details much appreciated.
When I converted my Alfa, I was doing a total re-wire that included relocating the fuses from underhood to underdash, and fabricating a whole new harness. The Alfa wiring is much simpler than that on an e9 - there is no A/C, and fewer electrical components. My point here is that working in the confined underdash area of an e9, and extending/re-terminating all of the wires that attach to the fuseblock will be a challenging job. But the blade-style fuses sure are a big improvement over the old-fashioned pointy ones.
Here is an "in-process" shot of my Alfa's wiring and fusebox (it looks a lot neater now that the job is completed). As you can see, I did this before installing the dash, providing much more space to work in. The Alfa only needed 6 fuses; I used a "3x2" fuse configuration because it was narrower than the "6x1". The challenge with doing this on an e9, is that you need 10 fuses, and I don't think an aftermarket blade-style 10 fuseblock is available. Maybe two "6x1".
I found it was easier to add circuits with a blade type fuse block and leave the stock panel in place rather than re-wiring the whole thing with an after market kit. I took the wiring harness apart from the engine compartment back to the fuse block to sort out some of my earlier wiring faux pas (s) and eliminate deleted circuits (ignition, A/C, chokes etc). In this set up the stock fuse block is powered by the distribution block.
The distribution block has battery cable in, alternator charge in, cable out to the starter and also powers the sub panel under the stock fuse block. There's a second blade type subpanel behind the glove box that supplies all of the EFI/ECU/coil packs needs.
Having just reattached the trip odometer cable to the underdash panel, hooked up the reverse light wire plug and resecuring the underdash panel, it isn't much fun working under there. I can't even imagine attempting that without removing the dash.
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