I’ve been driving and working on this, but not as much as I’d like. I repaired the floor panel over the transmission and painted. I installed some sound and thermal barrier on the floor and toe board along with the under mat and floor mat. I sure wish I had put something more under the firewall mat. I still need to figure something out for under the seats. I get a bit of road noise through the floor, and engine noise through the firewall. With the cooler weather I mounted the temp controls. Added a radio in that bracket too. I made that bracket to accommodate the A/C unit as well. I needed to mount some dummy lights so I made a bracket for below the gauge cluster. It includes the turn signal indicators, Battery, Brake, and CEL. I have been working on the Gauge Cluster. The original gauge cluster doesn’t have much to offer except the look. The oil and temp are mechanical, the donor is electrical. The gas gauge is the wrong scale for the donor sending unit. The Battery gauge is the only one that could work as it is a current meter. Since I’m swapping out the other gauges, I’ll do them all. The donor gauges are big. I tore down both clusters to see what I have to work with. I started to fit the donor gauges to the original housing. I made a template from a to-go lid to identify where the gauge needle pins are located. Things went sideways here and I had to back up. I cut some holes in the original cluster can and soon discovered the donor gauges are too big to get the needle pins in the same place as the originals. I thought about it. The way the original is assembled, I would need a bracket to mount the donor gauges to. I made a bracket and placed the donor gauges as close together as I could. I’m trying to get everything lined up, but there is too great of a margin of error with the hand tools. The gauges are not perfectly aligned with the holes in the bracket, but close enough. Next is to locate the gauge plates. I had purchased another gauge cluster for parts, I’m using it for this measurement. I cut a ring that matches the outer diameter of the gauge plates and taped the plates to it. Aligned the plates to the needle pins. Marked the holes, drilled them, and installed some M2 bolts. I then mounted the plates to the bracket. Now I could see how the donor gauges will meet the gauge plates. They are too far out to have the same stop as the original. The original gauges needles have a dog leg that meets the contour of the slot in the plates. This acts as the stops and keeps the needles from swinging off the face. I wanted to use the original needles for this purpose, but I’ll make it work as it is. I’ll use the plate bolts as stops and make my own needles. I removed the brass hubs from the donor needles, and placed them on the gauge pins. They are too tall, and the plate bolts are also too tall. I placed the gauge label piece to see the fit. I cut the needle hubs down. I cut some needles from some hobby stock. I soldered the needles to the hubs, and bent the needles over. The test fit of the needles revealed that the contours need to be trimmed. I suspect I’ll need to add some ballast to the back side of the needles as both the donor and the original mechanisms had such, and I’m running two of these gauges upside down. The bolts I have for the gauge plates are M2 12mm. I need about half that length, but the local fastener shop has only 10mm. I “cut to fit” the bolts that I have. Now the gauge label piece sits down as it should. I made a paper template to place the holes for the ½” standoffs to mount the gauge bracket to the cluster can. The cluster can has Two backlights. There is a baffle next to each light, it is about ½” tall. With the gauges mounted to the can, I’m one step closer. I made a circuit board out of prototyping board and soldered the gauge sockets to it. After plugging the gauge cluster to the circuit board, I cut down a coffee can to use as the rear housing. I’ve refaced the gauge plates. Next step is paint and wiring.
