Safe to cut these wires?
Since I got the car a couple years ago, I removed the radio in favor of one of those cubby things and moved the gauges up in place of the stereo. (Speakers weren’t working anyway and I can always listen to my phone if I feel like it) The cubby has never fit quite well enough because of this mess that PO’s left in there. I know which wires go to the gauges, so would it be safe for me to just snip the radio wires and tape the ends to get that rat nest out of there?
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icb
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In general, if you carefully cut away any obviously non-factory T and butt connectored wires that are only connected at one point to a factory wire, with the other end clearly not going anywhere (like the black connector in your left hand in the pic), you will be fine. Do yourself a huge favor and get a roll of Tesa cloth tape to tape up the factory harness that's left behind, or you'll be dealing with a sticky mess if you ever have to re-connect to those factory wires.
You should still be able to find a factory service manual vol5 wiring on line to download if you want to identify factory wires' function using the color codes. Good luck!
You should still be able to find a factory service manual vol5 wiring on line to download if you want to identify factory wires' function using the color codes. Good luck!
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Tom
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It looks like someone went to a lot of effort to adapt the 944's wires to a standard wiring scheme. I'd probably label the factory wires before cutting them, just to preserve that work. I often use adhesive lined heat shrink tubing on the end of cut wires. You can leave a few mm hanging off the end and seal it all off that way. Then bundle them with harness tape (like that no-stick Tesa tape ICB suggests as electrical wire does leave a gooey mess over time).
I'm not a fan of crimp connectors for the stereo, not because they are all inherently bad but because the crimps are very often done poorly. (That said, the blue ones might be inherently bad if they are vampire style that cut through the insulation and rub against the edge of the wires.) So, even if you re-install a stereo at some point, I'd personally cut all that off and solder the wires on, and cover the joints with adhesive lined heat shrink. Lots of schools of thought on that, but that's my way....
I'm not a fan of crimp connectors for the stereo, not because they are all inherently bad but because the crimps are very often done poorly. (That said, the blue ones might be inherently bad if they are vampire style that cut through the insulation and rub against the edge of the wires.) So, even if you re-install a stereo at some point, I'd personally cut all that off and solder the wires on, and cover the joints with adhesive lined heat shrink. Lots of schools of thought on that, but that's my way....