I was bored yesterday, so I thought I'd make some white faced gauges. Enjoy








Very easy project for those of you who have been putting it off.

 

How do they look at night? That is a big concern with me.

 

I'm working on that still...

The factory lighting from behind will not do the job. I'm thinking about using EL wire from someone like streetglow and lighting from in front of the bezel, but that will only work if I can use the dimmer as well.

If I don't go that route, I'm thinking of side lighting the plastic cover with LED's to give off a glow bright enough to illuminate the gauge.

The needle still shines fine, just need to find the best way to make the numbers visable.

I'll let you know as I test out different things as to what works and what doesn't.

 

Mind if I tack those up on me website?

 

be my guest...

Let me know if you want better shots of any of them to see the different fonts and such.

 

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man you guys are lucky. Your gauges light up on teh sides and top of the gauges. While mines are back lit. So I can really make my own gauge faces.

 

No, mine are actually back lit....at the moment I can get by at night because it shines just enough through the paper that I can see the numbers behind it.

I'm working on a way to front light the gauges now though.

 

I have the Camaro backlit guages and when I had my guages out to put the white face overlays on I painted the backs where it is blue with a chrome paint and a modle car paint brush. You loose the blue tone effect but the increase in brightness was worth it to me.

 

**** in that case imma make my own gauge faces. Cause my gauges dont really even work! haha...speedometer gauge is broken, gas gauge is broken, hmmm..what else? haha...and also Imma put a Z gauge in there some day also. So hey cool. I guess imma make me some. Probably change it even. Instead of 110mph I'll put HOLY **** AND BEYOND! haha or soemthing like that

 

Your gauges look good!

Praise is due to un4given for his good work

What did you use to print your gauges? A colour ink jet?

 

<- Wonders what flourescent numbers and ultraviolet bulbs would look like....

 

un4givin89 did do a good job with his templates, but ultimately I scanned my own gauges and modified them myself. I used his as a reference only.

As far as paper, I just used some heavy stock that I had lying around...not sure on the weight or brightness though.

 

OK, but what kind of colour printer was it, a laser or ink jet?

 

Just a plain ol Canon bubble jet printer...BJC-2000 if you want exact

 

you sank my battleship

 

I got the templates, but anyways I think if you use photgraphic paper, or better yet thermo paper the light will shine through better. Just a thought!

 

Hmm, if and when I do the white gauge routine I'm going to try to track down a colour laser printer, just to have that razor sharp printing, and especially the red for the redline on the tach.

 

What did you use to attach the overlay to the
actual guage? I am currently doing this swap on
my 89 RS and I used Kodak Matte Photo Paper
then used a glue stick to glue it to the CD
stickers that un4givin89 reccomends. Seems
to be working good. I have all of them done
accept the speedo. I will post pics when its
all done.