The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Removal of Gauge Clusters

What is the correct and best way to remove the 2 original gauge clusters from the dash of my Chevy 1955 first series truck? Thanks in advance.

The best way is to have someone young and flexible to do it for you.

There's lots of stuff in the way, including the steering column. You may need a flexible socket on a nut driver to get at the 4 nuts holding each cluster on. You'll need to remove the speedo cable, then get the clusters down below the dash where you can remove the wires and the oil pressure tube (maybe undo that one before pulling the gauge cluster out.) The light sockets pull out so do that to get those wires out of the way first.
Good luck.

I just pulled the speedo from mine and I was able to gain access by removing the radio grill. It gives you a lot of room to get your hand and arm in there.

I also put a milk crate on the floor - its the same height as the seat - to lay on.

Removing the speaker grille is a good idea. You can just sit on the seat and use the braille method to get things removed, especially things like the speedo cable and light sockets.

A tip that I read about here a while ago is to use knurled brass nuts when putting the gauges back in. I used this in an AD and they worked great. You can get a good tightness by hand. As Kevin said use the braille method once you get your hand up in there. Concur about removing the radio grille. I'm not sure how Task Forces gauges are attached, but if they attach the same way as an AD, they should work. Brass Knurled Nuts Not sure of the size and you can buy them in singles. (You won't need 50!)

That's what I did/am doing. I got the nuts at Ace Hardware.

He'll need a saws-all. The speaker grille doesn't come off of a 55.1

Gauge nuts are 10-32. I bought some knurled nuts to reinstall my Speedo and radio grill but haven’t got around to it yet.

Better yet, I think, would be long coupler nuts. But I’ve yet to find those in fine thread.

Oh man! What a ripoff!

Mark, your link to McMaster requires a login.
Here's a screenshot of the info.

$8 each!!!

That is for Stainless Steel. Zinc plated are only 58 cents each.

Well, someone did say long coupler nuts.

Has anyone actually tried the coupler nut thing?

In my brain, they would make things much easier. But there are so many interferences under the dash, that they might just create new interferences.

I removed and repaired the two gages in out 1948 ½ ton pickup and I reused the old retaining nuts. It’s crowded and you have to contort to get them out and in.

Can’t vouch for the coupler nut, but the small brass knurled nuts work great. I don’t see why the coupler nuts would be much different. I bought mine in Lowes, two for $1.48.

For anyone interested, here's what I think Phil said he purchased below. I bought the same for when it's time to work on mine.

Thank goodness I am small. When I did my R&R of the cluster I used a seat cushion to lay on and got my head up into the dash and arm up and around the steering column.. removal was much easier than installation.. Since I was rewiring and getting new clusters I just cut everything and the clusters dropped out.. I used a small socket set with an extension to remove the metal nuts they used to hold the clusters in.

Doug

I just finished installing my rebuilt speedometer. I used knurled nuts and they are definitely the way to go. I had it zipped up in less than 10 minutes.

Thankfully somebody mentioned knurled nuts over wing nuts. The good thing about knurled nuts is they have a large conical opening that guides the threads onto the stud. Very easy.