The gauge panel in my 86 Camaro is pretty weak. Its a speedometer that goes to a pathetic 85MPH(the car goes much much faster than this), a gigantic fuel gauge, with a cluster of three small gauges for water, battery, and oil. THERE IS NO TACH!

I want at least a 145MPH speedo and a tach filling the two large gauge cups with battery, oil, and fuel level filling the three small ones. Would I run into any problems doing this?

 

You would have to change out the oil pressure sender & temperature sender units to gauge type senders, since the senders are idiot light type senders for the cluster you have at present. You would also have to run a wire from the coil to the cluster for the tach.

Tim

 

There might be a problem with the speedo; my '86 Firebird has a cable-controlled 85 mph speedo. The 145 speedos are from later model cars, right? I think the changeover year from a cable-driven to an electrically-driven (altho still having a needle!) was 88 or 89.

You'll see a yellow box behind your speedo; that's the VSS / Vehicle Speed Sensor. On cable-driven speedos, a cable goes from the trans to the speedo, and spins the speedo. The speedo then spins the VSS, which goes to the computer.

On electrical speedos, the VSS sensor's in the tailshaft of the transmission. A wire goes from the transmission to the speedo, and from the speedo to the computer. (Roughly..)

So, keep that in mind for the switch... sorry I can't help you more.


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-Tom P (Hot rodded 1986 Firebird 2.8l) from http://www.f-body.net/mailbag/3rd/3rd_mailbag.html message boards
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The first year for non cable driven speedos for the Camaro (excluding the Berlinetta) was '90. The first year for the 145 mph speedo was late '86. With the cable driven speedos, the VSS buffer, mounted on the rear of the cluster, uses an optical transmitter / receiver pair (LED & photo diode) to create a pulse signal from a reflective chopper disk that is spun by the speedo cable. The VSS buffer sends a 4000 pulse per mile signal to the ECM, and a 2000 pulse per mile signal to the cruise control module. With the non cable driven speedos, the VSS, that is mounted in the transmission tail shaft housing, is connected to the VSS buffer, which is located in the ECM. The ECM sends a 4000 pulse per mile signal to the cluster, to drive the speedo, and a 2000 pulse per mile signal to the cruise control module.

Tim