'97+ Power Door Swap

[CatfishJoe]

 

Hey all,

I got tired of being unable to roll the passenger window down easily from the drivers side, so I decided to go ahead and swap in a set of full power options doors from an 01 XJ to match my 01 fenders and header. This means power locks, windows, mirrors, and a whole lot of messing around with wire diagrams and head scratching. I did a search of the forums and found some solid write ups on swapping out the door mounting hardware and bracketry. One area I found lacking was the wiring. This prompted me to do a not so little write up on how I got it done using the stock doors and harness off my donor. Keep in mind there will be differences between years/trim levels, and this is no means a definitive guide for all applications. Now to get into it:

 

Recommended tools:
-    MULTIMETER
-    Soldering iron
-    Terminal crimpers 
-    Wire strippers
-    Basic hand tools + screwdrivers

-    Wiring diagrams

 

 

Materials I used:
-    ’01 XJ Power doors
-    ’01 XJ Engine bay fuse box
-    Fuse box wire from XJ
-    Heat shrink 
-    Solder
-    Electrical tape
-    Harness covering (Split loom or whatever you like)
-    (2) 20A fuses, (1) 10A fuse

-    Assorted lengths and gauges of wire, if you're building your own harness, use 12AWG to be safe (16AWG For mirror circuit)

 

Check the wiring in the doors first! More on this later.

 

I was able to pull the doors and all the interior wiring I could need out of my donor vehicle. This includes the cross body harness, and the main interior clip that runs along under the dash. I cut out all unnecessary wires from the connectors and cross body harness and was left with this:

 

 

I then decided I wanted to run all the wires along under the dash, combined it with the existing 01 under dash wiring and cut it down to reach from door to door.

 

I eliminated the big greasy C200/C201 connectors, and the bulkhead connectors:

 

 

The 01 XJ uses a junction block in the lower right kick panel to act as a splice and power distribution center to all the circuits needed. I chose to eliminate it, and instead use an auxiliary fuse box located in the engine bay for power distribution. I was able to pull the fuse box from the XJ and used that as my power and relay center. I tapped the run-acc circuit for the windows and mirrors off of a dark brown or black (it's dark down there) wire under the steering column, using my multimeter (or test light) to determine which wire would receive power in those key positions. To do this, put one meter probe or test light clamp onto the ground bolt located above the hood release handle, and back probe the large, black, flat connector below the steering column wire by wire, first with the key out of the ignition, then with the key in the run and acc positions. I used this wire to connect to pin 86 on my relay, grounded pin 85, sent fused constant power to pin 30, and keyed power from pin 87 (N.O. contacts) to the switch.

 

My understanding of how the power goes from fuses to doors is this:

1.    Constant power comes in from the battery to the passenger door, energizing the locks on a red wire.
2.    Keyed power for the windows comes into the drivers door on a tan wire
3.    Keyed power for the mirrors comes into the drivers door on a yellow/dark green wire

The tan wires are the same 20A circuit, so I spliced them together and added a tail to run to the aux fuse box, fed by the relay.

 

The conductors required in my modified under dash harness the way I decided to wire it, are as follows:
Red – Door lock power, constant 12V
Tan – Keyed power for all accessories, run from added aux fuse box
Yellow – Switch power jumper for windows from drivers switch to passenger
Brown/White + Violet/White – Window motor jumpers
Orange/Violet + Pink/Violet – Lock switch (signal) jumpers from passenger to driver
Orange/Black + Pink/Black – Lock motor power
Yellow/Dark Green – Keyed 10A mirror power 
Orange/Yellow – Power mirror common
Dark Blue – Power mirror motor
Yellow/Black – Power mirror motor
Black - Ground

 

This left me with 12 wires running from door to door, as the red wire only enters on the passenger side, and the yellow/dark green on the driver’s side. There are a few more wires needed if you want the speaker wires as part of this harness, but I chose to skip the headache and keep the wiring my truck currently had and spliced through to the door speakers. In hindsight, it would’ve been way easier to custom make a harness from scratch and skip all the connector deleting and soldering, but since I got all the wiring from the donor for next to nothing I decided to use it.

 

Next was bench testing! It’s always a good idea to test things before prettying up your harness and buttoning everything up. First go, I hooked everything up and was a bit shocked to see I could only lock my doors. After some head scratching and getting my money’s worth out of my multimeter I found that the ground in the door harness itself was right buggered. So if you’re planning to do this conversion in the future make sure you CHECK THE WIRING IN THE DOORS! It will save you a lot of time and sanity once you get to testing everything. Using the continuity feature on your meter, put one probe onto one wire in the connector coming out of the door, and the other probe on the same colour wire in the connector at the switch/lock actuator/window motor/mirror connector. The meter should beep, or read a low ohmic value. If your meter does not beep, and/or indicates infinite resistance (0L on some), you have a broken wire.

 

Also note, I couldn’t get the doors to unlock initially. After messing with the passenger side DOOR harness, I found that the light blue, and light blue/red wires in the smaller passenger switch connector needed to be spliced together. I didn’t see these wires on my look through of the diagrams, but assume it must be for some keyless entry module or something similar. After splicing, all works as it should. Be sure you’re using the correct light blue/red wire, as the speakers use the same colour.

 

I mounted the 01 fuse box in the engine bay like this:

 

 

 

Bolted everything up to my MJ, modifying the door striker, running the harness along behind the lower dash panel and fishing the door wires through the body. I fed the wires from my engine bay fuse box through a grommet in the firewall to get into the cab, then branched off as needed. Make sure all your connections are clean, tight, and free from stress/strain, as this could cause strange issues with intermittent connections between terminals. After tidying the harness up a bit, I tested it all again using my new fuse box and harness.

 

The easiest way to do this swap if I were to do it again for someone who wanted it done would be this:

-    Run 8AWG stranded conductor from battery to fuse block
-    Run 12AWG from 20A fuse to passenger door switch (Red)
-    10A fuse to mirror power
-    Run signal wire from keyed power (existing) to pin 86 on relay
-    Ground pin 85 on relay
-    20A fuse from holder to pin 30 on relay
-    Window power to pin 87 on relay (Tan)
-    Jump the light blue + light blue/red wires in the passenger door
-    Build a harness with 2 door lock motor jumpers, 2 door lock signal wires, 1 window power jumper, 2 window motor jumpers, 3 power mirror jumpers (common, motor 1, motor 2), a keyed accessory power (from relay) and a 12AWG wire grounded securely to the vehicle
-    Run my 3 power wires (Constant, keyed, mirrors) into the cab from fuses and splice/connect to interior harness.

 

You can use the stock connectors from the 01 and tuck them up under the dash and everything will work fine. Since I wanted my doors to be easily removable, I used the door connectors from my roommates ’94 ZJ with the infinity sound system. These are awesome oval shaped connectors with a whole lot of terminals that are fastened together with a bolt. I removed the bolt by drilling out the head to make unplugging them quick and easy. I then oval-ed out the hole for the rubber door boot on the truck’s body, screwed and then siliconed them in place to prevent moisture intrusion. Having a good soldering iron is a huge asset for adding these connectors, as there are a whole lot of wires to splice.

All done!

 

 

 

 

That’s about all I can think of for now, let me know if you guys have any questions or comments!
 

[MJXJjeepguy]

Wow that the best write-up for 97+ door swap! Very rich information. 

[CatfishJoe]

Thanks! Electrical can be real finicky and it never hurts to have extra info. Speaking of which, I drew up a wiring diagram for anyone who likes more visual instruction (like myself).

 

 

Keep in mind the up/down wires I've labeled aren't necessarily the correct colour, for example I'm not sure if pink/black is actually the door lock wire, just that it and orange/black control the lock/unlock functions.

Edited April 6, 2020 by CatfishJoe
Fixed photo

[87Chief]

These pictures are X's for me...

 

 

[Airborne Janitor]

CatfishJoe, thanks for taking the time for putting together an in depth write-up and wiring diagram. I was able to wire up my 97 XJ Country doors to my MJ thanks to you. I will say your wiring diagram was spot on except I needed to wire up a brown/white wire for the power windows instead of blue/white. Also my mirror power wire was brown/pink instead of yellow/green. I reviewed several wiring diagrams and it appears that the driver lightblue/yellow wire and the passenger black/white wire control the power mirror defog circuit, at least for a 97. I decided to leave it as is. 

 

I built my own wiring harness, but I did cut off the pigtails on the driver side door harness to reuse. Per your advice I used both 12ga and 16ga wiring, I purchased bulk wiring in colors from acdcwireandsupply on ebay.

 

 

I also installed a Painless Wiring fuse block 70107 on the engine side firewall which has a mix of constant hot and ignition hot circuits to tap into. 

 

 

With 13 wires to run from door to door I didnt have any luck trying to squeeze them under the dash to hide them away. So I decided to run the wiring along the edge of the floorboard and along the back of the cab under the carpet. 

 

 

I used a ton of crimp on quick-disconnects for the passenger door wiring. I ran the power wires from the fuse block thru the firewall on the passenger side. 

 

 

After testing the wiring, everything worked except the door locks, I could hear them click but not actually engage. The passenger window control also would only lower the window, not raise it. Replacing the passenger window switch fixed all my issues thankfully. Very happy to have this part of my MJ project complete. 

 

 

[Airborne Janitor]

Also wanted to note that wiring the passenger lock circuit directly to constant 12v leaves the passenger door lock switch energized and glowing. I got curious and checked my 98 XJ but the door lock switch does not illuminate with the vehicle off despite having power? It's not a big deal but I did wonder about the constant power draw, as well as having the light on all the time...

 

[CatfishJoe]

Airborne, glad I could help out some! I figured the wire colours might not translate for all years, nice to know that's the case. Nice install! That's some tidy wiring you've got around the cab and by that fuse block 

 

As for the constantly lit door lock, I've got the same deal going on in mine. Not too sure what that's about honestly. Might dig in to it again just out of curiosity. I'll let you know if I get anywhere with that!

[Airborne Janitor]

I mean it makes sense that the passenger door lock needs constant power. But I wonder what makes a 97+ XJ switch/light turn off? Maybe theres something in the XJ fuse block/PDC that halts power to the switch/light, until the switch is activated?

[Phillip Gwin]

Thank you for going through all of this. It is quite helpful.

[boxyjeep]

On 8/29/2019 at 5:53 PM, CatfishJoe said:

Thanks! Electrical can be real finicky and it never hurts to have extra info. Speaking of which, I drew up a wiring diagram for anyone who likes more visual instruction (like myself)

 

 

Keep in mind the up/down wires I've labeled aren't necessarily the correct colour, for example I'm not sure if pink/black is actually the door lock wire, just that it and orange/black control the lock/unlock functions.

 

I don't think this is correct, as you're supplying a constant 12v to RUN-ACC POWER on the passenger door.  I believe that should be connected to terminal 87 on the relay..

[CatfishJoe]

On 2/29/2020 at 7:41 AM, Chargum85 said:

 

I don't think this is correct, as you're supplying a constant 12v to RUN-ACC POWER on the passenger door.  I believe that should be connected to terminal 87 on the relay..

Yep my bad, got a lil sloppy with the drawing there. Thanks for the correction! I'll update the post shortly

[RedDemon90]

Any body wanna make me a harness lol I'm not good at wiring?

[boxyjeep]

On 3/29/2020 at 3:14 PM, RedDemon90 said:

Any body wanna make me a harness lol I'm not good at wiring?

 

Ha!  It's a pain for sure.  I had a few wires in the door harnesses that had broken apart too.  That was fun to troubleshoot since I thought it was an issue with my patching.  The diagram above is really good--just make the one change mentioned.

[thecodemonk]

Dude!  This is amazing and immensely helpful!  I can't wait to do this on my MJ, since I have donor 01 XJ doors ready for me