BAD LUK

I have removed the needles on my gagues while in the process of converting to a blue led set-up.
I haven't found much info on the effects of removing the needles.
how much trouble have I gotten myself into?

Jpr5690

iTrader: (13)

i think all ya gotta do is recalbrate them ie. find out what they should be reading (autotap) and make sure you stick the needles back so they read that

LS1ruben

WIth autotap/efilive you should be able to find out your rpm, speed, gas, voltage. But you will not be able to find your oil pressure.

Lithium

iTrader: (47)

dude its a pain the *** to get them back on right...

Just got to mess around with them, took me a few hours to get them all on right. I have a shift light as well so that helped with the tach. I also drove next to someone for the speedo...but it does suck.

Cephiros

when i did it i got luckey, everything went where there sposed to be besides the temp guage, not 100% positive on oil or voltage, but they both appear rigth as well

temp guage is like a quarter turn off tho, it is one major pain in the ***, i dont recommend doing it :/

FloridaZ

Before you removed them you should have.. Started the car, and let it warm up, reaching it's normal temps and idle rpms. Then just make a note of where all the gauges are pointing. Then remove them. When your ready to put them back on, start it up and let it warm up again.

If you didn't do that, there is no telling how off they are if any. With the method above you can get them pretty accurate.

Just a question though... why did you remove the needles if you were just swapping out bulbs? Or did you get some overlays?

BAD LUK

I did order new bulbs, but I got too far into taking the dash apart without thinking.
I was trying to go the 'take the stock overlay off and remove the red parts' route before I did enough searching.

I figured I could get the red parts off easily so i could use the stock overlay without having to buy an over-overlay. Then it turned out to be not so easy, then thought about the needles.

Guess I f'ed up pretty good this time.
Can the dash be calibrated to 'zero'?
Any ideas on what would take the red film off the back of the stock overlay? I have tried goo-gone & paint thinner. Also tried sanding the areas, but it takes forever.


Why did they have to make it red?!!!!!!!

Jpr5690

iTrader: (13)

temp gauge dont work in 99+ cars anaway so just adjust it to read 210 and your set as far as oil pressure id just set it for an avg setting that our car has at idle it wont kill you to be a few psi off the volts are simple to findout with a cheep volt meter or just set it to read 12.5 with the engine off (key turned to acc) now your down to speedo and rmps which you could either use a freinds car for a speedo calbration or findyour self one of those road side signs that clock you and use that once you get the speedo down you can caculate your rpms at a certain speed ina certain gear and set them that way ....and i think that covers it all or just get\borrow atap, preditor, efilive and use that for all but oil pressure and you can pritty much guesstmate that one pritty easily

FloridaZ

If all else fails, you could always try to pick up a camaro cluster off ebay or some place from a junked car. Might be the easiest way.