During my cylinder head removal over the weekend, I had to take the dremmel to a metal strap that secures the wiring harness to the rear of the LH cylinder head (Bolt securing strap to cylinder head was rounded and could not get an extractor to bite down on bolt head). It appears that in the process of cutting the strap, I nicked the vehicle-wiring-harness-side of the crank position sensor connector. At first I thought I had gotten lucky and only nicked the sheath around the 3 individually sheathed wires in the harness, but after a closer look I can definitely see bare copper through the cut in the sheathing. I can't tell if I only nicked one of the 3 wires in the bundle or possibly 2, and I'm not sure if I possibly cut through one entirely. I definitely don't want to finish this job (head gasket replacement) and with everything put back together, go to hit the ignition and the engine crank over but not start.


As much as I don't want to, I feel like I should try to strip back the outer sheathing of the bundle to determine how many of the 3 wires are damaged, and at least try to cleanly splice back together those that are damaged. As tightly as these are bound, I may end up doing more damage than good trying to determine what is nicked and what isn't. I just worry about this being a possible failure/weak point if I cut and splice back together. Other than tracing the crank position sensor harness back to its origin , which very well may be the ECM, and trying to replace the entire thing, does anyone have any suggestions on the best course of action for addressing this/making the repair? If I'm opening it up, cutting and splicing, I'd prefer to use as skinny of a connector as possible and using heat shrink tubes to make sure it is as tight/secure as possible and will stay dry, hopefully.

 

Silver solder the wires and then apply shrink tube. I don't trust connectors unless they're waterproof to prevent copper corrosion.