One of the last major pieces of the puzzle that must be solved prior to beginning to wire the entire wagon is to locate and mount the fuse blocks for both the computer system and for the rest of the body wiring, and to provide a convenient place to mount the engine/transmission controller computer’s Data Link Connector (DLC) which allows you to attach either a laptop or handheld tester to download diagnostic data and error messages.

Thanks to the size of the HVAC unit I no longer have any room for the glove box, but it does provide an easy access location for the fuse block; I am now really wishing I had bought an under dash unit instead of the behind the dash version that takes up a bunch of space.

As usual it takes me two or three attempts to come up with a workable solution. For my 1st attempt, I had forgot to provide a place to mount the DLC … duh. I really liked the 2nd attempt in that it was mounted only to the cowl so that the dash board could be removed without having to remove the fuse panel or bother the wiring. The other advantage was that I could take the panel loose and have easy access to the relay panel that was behind it. All was just wonderful until I bolted the HVAC unit into place when I found that the fuse panel would pretty much block the right most A/C outlet. So I had to trim off a good portion of the panel that was below the body fuse panel, when I did that the part of the panel that held the engine controller fuse block was very floppy. Sooo…

With the third attempt, I had to extend the length of the panel downward and break a tab on it to mount it to the bottom of the dashboard, which defeated part of my original design, but it is workable solution, it will just take a bit more fussing if I have to get to the relays.

The New Fuse Panel

Next up stripping the paint off of the dashboard and refinishing and painting it! Then on to wiring!