.
my guess, would be around $1,000.00 labor

Tough to say.  I think you'd need to figure about $50/hr., so $1,000 gets you 20 hours.  Might be enough depending on the guy's level of experience with similar projects, might be double that.  In general it takes two to three times as long to do something the first time, so if there is expereince it could save you some coin. 

The most time consuming part of dealing with the Painless harness is going to be making all the terminations.  You might consider the cost savings of using a factory style chassis harness and simply adding an auxillary fuse box if you need to add accessories.  I would ask the prospective people what way they would handle it, given their druthers. 

.
Painless wiring = Painful wiring.

It all depends on finances as to which way you go, but I will say this.  I saw a 66 convertible v8, auto, car last yr. and it was burned 3/4 of the way.  Guess which part of the car was still good?  The front end.
The car had an electrical fire in dash, it was really sad to see.  The car looked like a really good car judging from the front.  I know that's a downer, but I say it with the best of intentions.  Nothing worse than spending $15, 20, 25k in a car only to have an electrical fire take it all away.
I'm going with AAW, traded an old 4 wheeler for the wiring install. Value $800-1000.

I would strongly recommend sending  your original harnesses to Mid Life Harnesses..850-248-1967.....for restoration...Randy will restore them for less then half the cost of new ones...I believe he can also weave in the EFI wires for a Plug and Play....jj

Last edited by jerseyjoe (3/25/2015 7:03 AM)

If you're running a carberator then you only need one harness.  B/c my setup is EFI I need two harnesses.  The problem w/ just going and getting a harness and getting it modified is that the lengths are likely to come out wrong.  What I discovered was the idiot who previously wired the car spliced and extended a few dozen wires to make everything work which required cutting stock connections and lots of electrical tape.  Worst of this was cutting a huge whole in the firewall to get the EFI harness connector to reach rather than routing it correctly. 

This is my logic for going w/ a painless or similar wiring kit.  Since you have to add the connectors yourself you can set the correct length.  Honestly, if I could pay double and know it was done right I would.  I'm so fed up w/ running into these 'I can do anything' types that talk a big game and under deliver.

Last year, before the Bash, II replaced the old origional-ish(cos there were plenty of mod re-wires) with an American auto wire kit. I AM NO ELECTRICIAN!!!!
When it was done, turned out to be less hassle than I imagined, it was easy(relatively) to interface with mods; EFI, 4R70W quick one shift controler, electric windows, add nausium. And the trick thing was it all worked, even stuff that haden't worked in years. So I've been happy with my experience with them. I was able to stump their expert assistance, Hehheh
I do now own a set of the wire crimpers American Auto Wire rents, cos I kept them too long.

Tubo

Just go through the stock stuff you have now and ...SOLDER and SHRINK TUBE all the connections!   I even put sections of differnt color wire in the middle of the run just so bothth ends of a circuit would be the same color code. New runs I just numbered the wire on both ends ...especially when it passed through the firewall or into the trunk. The little book of numbers is readily available so you can mark a particular run of wire several times(especially under the dash. ) A good solder joint and shrink tube connection  can't be too much less than a wire with no connections.
These things are "hobby carz" not factory clones! Enjoy working on it!! MHO
6sal6

Rather than try to dela with what the previous guy hacked up I'd fix whateve rhe did that you don't like.  If its a hole in the firewall, fix it, and put it where you want it.  Compromising on stuff like that will piss you off for years to come.  If its apart now, go whole hog, or else what's the point?

I rewired my car with stock replacment wiring from tail to nose in a couple hours each evening over maybe three days.  Get a factory assembly manual.  Its helps a ton with the routing.  I could easily add anything I want in the future.  If its too much for the stock setup I can add an auxillary fuse block for the accessories.  The stock wiring in these cars, properly reporoduced, is very durable and relaible.  The problem most times isn't that its bad from age, rather its been screwed up by 40+ years of hacks who didn't know how to do electrical work. 

Most shops I've found here want at least 26-30 an hour for doing electrical work.

I will have to re-wire my whole car as well.  When I took everything apart, the original harness had been hacked a few times by prior owners and many of the wires that weren't hacked were so dry and brittle that they cracked and broke. 

I've been reading a lot of opinions and had narrowed it down to Painless or  AAW.   Painless seemed like the most "painless" because it looks like a lot of terminals are already connected. I also watched the CJ video and it looked pretty easy.

For those of you that used Painless and had a bad experience, how long ago was it?  I am wondering if they've improved their product over the years.

Last edited by Chaplin (3/26/2015 9:08 AM)

I used the Painless kit for my 66 coupe.  If I had to do it again, I would not.  That being said, I have a lot of custom aftermarket products in my car, no where near stock.  My wiring guy basically cut about half of the wire harness out fo the Painless kit before we even started.  He told me if we were to start over we would have been better off building our own harness.  We have about 60-70 hours of time into my wiring and we still have another 10-20 hours to go.  My guy refuses to let me pay him, very thankful but I have been able to contribute to his car build with some parts.  With those hours you can imagine what I would have paid in money if he charged me!