How NOT to install Guido's replacement fuse board

In September of 2016, after a long trip in my QV with some other Mondialistas to Maronello, my electronics got to the point where only through some jury rigging was I able to make the 1000 kilometers back home. And that with the admonishment, “don't turn on anything electric unless you have to”.

A new fuse panel manufactured by Guido arrived a few weeks later along with the replacement female connectors that go on the ends of each wire – there are 87 of them I now know. I am all thumbs with most things and add to that dealing with electrics, what is posed as a relatively straightforward replacement process with very good instructions was not a challenge I wanted to accept. I decided therefore to entrust the process to a garage that specializes in Bosch electronics and engine management. I had used the fellow several times at the recommendation of other mechanics who were unable to resolve issues on my other old cars. He had also tracked down a few other electrical gremlins in my QV as well as installing the starter relay that has never failed me since. So I felt good about having him replace the fuse panel instead of giving it to my regular ferrari mechanics.



It requires taking off the white plastic connector (there are 8 of them) that hold a dozen or so of the wires in place, cutting off the old metal female connector, threading the wire through the slot in the plastic connector, attaching the new female piece and then of course connecting the female onto the male which is on the new board. You need to replace the female connector because Guido’s board uses a larger male/female than the originals.

What I did not realize at the time, was that in order to use the larger male/female metal connectors, Guido has turned the male connector 90 degrees so that they fit in the exact same spot on the board. The result of that is that you have to perform some delicate surgery on the white plastic connector with a dremel tool in order to have the female connector slot in with the 90 degree turn and the plastic connector click back in place, holding the metal connection in place on the board. Yes, I read the instructions when I gave them to my mechanic guy but it did not really register in my brain the delicacy of this effort with the plastic connector. It is the plastic afterall that insulates each pair of metal connectors from the one next to it.

By the end of October 2016 the job was done. The guy said it started off a bit difficult but then things went smoothly. I only now know why.

Through that winter and until last August, I really only did a few day drives with my Mondi and things seemed fine. Everything worked as expected. Then in August I did a fairly long road trip of a couple thousand kilometers. I loved driving the car and it ran great. But on the way back, the AC began to act up. It would cool some but then would only blow air. Again, I did not have any trips planned but a few more drives found the AC not blowing cold air at all so I took it in to my regular ferrari guys for a few other things. They put in some new refrigerant but that did not seem to solve the problem and we thought must be a leak in the system or the compressor. So they injected some dye along with new refrigerant. But time passed, it got to be an absolutely awful rainy cold winter here and I certainly did not need the AC when I did take it out and I never took it back to my mechanics.

Finally, this April, I wanted to have the car serviced and for them to follow up the the AC problem in anticipation of the summer of driving. A day later I got a call from my mechanic saying, I could not drive the car like it was as it was too dangerous. They said they would have to replace all the female connectors with insulated connectors as there were serious short problems, one of which had caused the AC compressor to not function. A hasty drive over revealed the extent of the problem.

My expert auto electrical specialist, seems to have been as ham handed as I am. He began the effort to make the cuts in the plastic so that the female connector can be turned 90 degrees. But none were done with finesse, many left barely a sliver of plastic on one side, some left no plastic at all between the adjacent connector, thus nothing insulating between two wires into the panel. And if and when they came lose, it created a major short problem. Indeed one plastic connector was totally melted between two of the wires into the panel. That is where the AC shorted out and luckily it also shorted the fuse and the relay.

Further, the guy had stopped even trying to make the slot cuts into the plastic at all. He ended up just slicing off the back half of the plastic connector altogether. Then he threaded the wire through, crimped it (not even soldering it), stuck it on the male lead then pushed the white plastic piece in place, hiding the problem. As vibrations and driving occurred, some of the connectors inevitably came loose and contact between them occurred.

Luckily, I was able to get a complete set of white plastic connectors from Red Bay and my regular mechanics painstakingly cut the slots, reinstalled the female connectors soldering them in place and now having the plastic insulation between each wire. It took two man days to have it done right.

In the end, I realize how lucky I was to have had the AC stop working. Had it been some other connectors shorting out, I might not have paid attention to it or had reason for the mechanics to look into it. It still started and ran well so I was in no way warned there was a problem. After all, the “expert” had done the panel replacement. Little did I know how close I came to having my Mondi go up in flames.

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