A few comments on the new wiring harness:
The new harness was not an absolute necessity, but it was something that I wanted to do at this point given how much time I was having to spend fixing the existing harness. The existing harness had been chopped up in at least a dozen places (dash and engine) for various reasons. This made it very difficult to troubleshoot the many electrical issues I have been having. As an added benefit, the new harness will make later changes to the wiring for more modern gauges and accessories unnecessary.
Old fuse box. I had six different wires clipped into the front of this for power as the leads that should have been used had been cut out/used for other purposes.
New fuse box, note the more modern style of fuses and greater number of fuses.
I wanted to point out that the new harness wiring has two nifty features. One is that it is a heavier gauge wire, which is just easier to work with. The other is that all the wires are labeled every few feet along their entire length. This is a
huge help as it almost eliminates having to look up wire color codes and such. Also, the harness comes with a number of replacement switches. Not bad for ~$500.