how to connect illumination wire

i have a 1988 cadillac fleetwood brougham i bought a wiring harness and i went color for color but the is one orange wire that controls the illumination and dash lights. at first i hooked the illimination to the red wires it plays but it kept popping the fuse.  I disconnected the orange from them and the radio plays but at night i gets no dash lights so i found another ground for it and it stills keep popping the fuse could anyone help me with this situation?christian da man

Just out of curiosity why would you randomly hook up that wire to other wires. I normally don't ever hook up the illumination or dimmer wires. The dash lights are out because you popped another fuse. Check ALL the fuses in the car and engine bay and replace the ones you blew. Then I would just leave that wire disconnected.

yeah, illumination is pretty useless most of the time

Oh well. when all else fails, splice it to anothe wire and crank it up. Man!"That'll get ya 10 in Leavenworth,11 in Twelveworth, or 5 & 10 in Woolworth". Groucho Marx                                                      

mrarff wrote: Oh well. when all else fails, splice it to anothe wire and crank it up. Man!

Perfect advice..........

it sounds like you connected the one illumination wire, to two of the wires on the harness?? maybe i just read that wrong, but if thats what you did, then that would be part of your problem. Aren't the wires labeled in anyway? on my car the wires are all labeled right on the insulation. I however, have an illum. wire, and a dim+ and dim- I still have no idea how to wire mine so the dimmer works.

I don't hook those up either....haven't had a complaint yet!  "Why does my dimmer not work?"  Nope....never heard anybody ask that....half of the truth can be worse than a lie. <----Roger Russell said that..