I did my time assembling harnesses at a robotics firm years ago. I made all sorts of harnesses and cables. The materials are not very expensive. The work is tedious but not technically difficult hence why I made assembler's wages. The tools are anywhere from 50 to 300 bucks a pop but you only buy them once and you only need a few. After you are tooled up, you can make lots of harnesses, not just these. If you figure you need say 4 hours to make one, that's a lot of time for someone who has become familiar with the process, you can go from there figuring your costs, how long it will take to recoup investment..etc... You'd want to make some sort of lighted test fixture where you just plug it in and if something doesn't light up, it's bad. That way it is easy to make them en masse and control quality.


Another benefit is that your product will be new, not a spliced together of old.


Frank.

The thing is Frank, even if Mike can make 1000 harness he has to SELL them. It might only take him 4 hours to make one (honestly I have no idea) but if he only sells one a week he still has to eat.

This is a small, specialized market and I think that we should be grateful that ORS even is giving us this option. If you want to build your own, go for it. If you want to help/tell others how to build their own harness, go for it. Do a write up and send it to 4x4Wire for publication! <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/notooth.gif" alt="" />

I don't see the point in complaining about Mike's prices though. They really aren't that out of line with what you would expect to pay from someone like Painless Wiring or Ron Francis, and it is MUCH more of a niche market. Props to ORS for giving us the option. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cheers.gif" alt="" />

The other issue is, Toyota kept changing little things from year to year and sometimes IN A SINGLE YEAR for pity's sake. I know one thing, every time someone wants to make an install of our product (enterprise software) easier on the customer (like Mike's goal of a new, plug and play harness), the hard part does NOT go away, it shifts to us. Which is as it should be - as long as we can still eat.

A little business thinkin' here: products can differentiate on price (low margin, high volume, not likely here), quality (I would expect that), or service/support (I would expect that here too). To play on a popular cartoon: Pick any two, they trade off against each other. Usually you get one.

I just hope the next time my head gasket blows I'm close to Wheat Ridge. 3.4 here I come! <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I know that I ran into this when I was wiring my cab. The harness from the cab to the gas tank and tail lights "looked" exactly the same between my 86 frame and the 87 cab, but it turns out that the connectors on the cab end are slightly different. Same color wires, same number of wires, but slightly different connectors. Just one small example of how frustrating this stuff can be. I would imagine that it is even more so when you do not have the vehicle right there in front of you.

Yeah, I think I would be willing to pay for someone else to experience those delights. The rest of the swap should provide plenty of entertainment for me. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" />

I'm gonna spend some time talking to Mike and maybe even contributing to the kit configuration. Then, I HOPE$$, I may be a guinea pig to shake out the bugs and maybe contribute to documentation. We'll see.

We have sayings about 'early adopters' that do not bear repeating in a public forum. But I think I am in good hands with Mike. Its only metal, how hard could it be. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" />

Hey Bill I completely agree with you. I personally like doing it myself. One thing Mike might want to think of is selling connector and pins or just the pigtails for the do it your selfers to figure out. I know it little money for that stuff but I know I would of payed for it instead of searching all the junkyards. Have a better list of componets for different vechicles like oil pan options. For instances I know I can reuse my 3.0 pan but my rig is sas so what would be the my best option. I wanted to use a 2wd T100 oil pan but finding one with out buying it from the dealer is a pain. So that could be an option as well. There are a lot of different configurations. Mike can make the consumer pick what they want to buy and what they want to do them selfs. Iam in the middle of mine I personally can't spend 600 or so hundred dollars on wiring when I am more than capable but I would have spent the money on the pigtails of certian connectors or pins and contectors. Just my thought.
Brandon

What I was getting at is that you can be more profitable with the ability to make numerous TYPES of harnesses (not just for engines) as you can spread costs out over a wider area. In this case, you'd employ someone else to do it as opposed to doing it yourself. (gives you more time to run your business) I'm sure you can see how this can make it easier to survive in a specialized market if you can use the same tooling to sell into a larger one at the same time.

Frank

If you look at the kit it is more than just the harness. I was first just going to pay the $699 for the harness. But the 2k would be worth it, since he has already done the swap several times. Having everything you need is far easier than scavenging and fabbing your own goods. I have done all of my own fabs, but sitting on the garage floor for hour(or days) on end looking at two wiring diagrams, tracing down wires, stripping/splicing/crimping wires........Just to find out that one of the wires is connected wrong, does not sound like fun, or even worth saving money. Somethings are just worth it to pay someone else for their work time and frustration.

Is there any reason that cobbling up a wiring harness for a 3.4, 5VZFE swap is harder than any other efi swap, like, say, putting 22RE in where a 22R once lived. I mean, you just get the FSM's and the wiring harnesses for the respective vehicles; and the 5VZFE ECU; and go to work, right? Or maybe there's something about the OBD-II that adds complications I dont know about.

In any case, there are a lot of really nice mid '90s 4runners out there that would make great daily drivers with a 3.4 under the hood.

Matt