Project 3.4 Camaro

actual gauges (not idiot lights), 85 mph mechanical (cable driven) speedo, v8 tach.

Would like to do a straight up trade for a v6 cluster with tach and real gauges, Got screwed over by some jackwagon on ebay, tach is way the hell off and it was the whole reason I bought it, so maybe if someone out there is swapping a v8 in for their v6...

gcj280

iTrader: (15)

i would be willing to purchase the 85mph cluster if you are interested...

is it in good working order?

thanks, Greg

Project 3.4 Camaro

Not looking to sell, I need to have a gauge cluster in my car, was looking for a direct trade, but after hearing that a v8 tach should only be 33% off I wonder if it is even close for a v8 car.....

x11nt4

You still looking to trade? I have 2 V6 clusters and need the V8

Project 3.4 Camaro

I am indeed actually, though I thought I wouldn't get any replies, been a while,lol, anyways, after posting I found out my tach might be a bit off even for a v8, there is a fix for it though that recalibrates it back to the norm, unfortunately, no one has the required info needed to do it for a v6 and I don't have the tools to find out the specs I would need.
But if the possibility of having to swap the resistor on the tach board doesn't put you off let me know, would like to know the details of your guage clusters though, and if you are put off by it possibly being inaccurate maybe we could trade with a little money in your favor, or just even trade if one of the clusters doesn't have real guages or something, let me know your thoughts, thanks.

x11nt4

I have both clusters out right now. The resistor fix I was going to do to one of my V6 tachs till I found your post. Both tachs work and sweep smoothly, I can't vouch for their accuracy since they are V6 and I am running V8 TPI setup. One I had to use a needle from another tach so it is white and not orange, the other cluster I just pulled out of the junkyard this weekend and I swore it came out of a V8 but it reads high like the other V6 tach does, reads about 500RPM higher than it should be, so I am sure it's a V6 tach. it's got all the orange needles. I would rather just swap the tach itself and not the whole cluster. If you wanted both tachs just for parts I would be willing to to a trade and maybe $15, or just a straight swap for one. Let me know.

Project 3.4 Camaro

Disregard my last PM, idk why I said that, for straight trade would only take as long as the shipping , that being said, I am doing some work on the ol maro today and will pull the v8 tach, my address is 146 whipple street, pittsburgh, pa, 15218, $5 flat rate is best shipping option, if you want to just go ahead and straight swap, just give me the address and say the word, do please be 100% positive that it IS indeed a v6 tach though, reason I got the v8 one was because the guy sold me it was dead wrong about what it was from, don't need another v8 tach I can't use lying around, let me know, thanks.
Also, I can get a pic if you would like, and would like to see a pic of each one that you have, there were some slight style differences over the years I think, plus I can confirm if both are v6 tachs.

x11nt4

You know what? I was having a major brain fart. I could really smack myself sometimes. I have a firebird, not a camaro. I was thinking this was a Fbird car. IDK if the tachs are internally the same or not, the face would obviously be different.. I'll tell you what though, I go to the junk yards a lot, I will keep my eye out for a V6 camaro cluster for you. I have seen many of them.

x11nt4

Actually, scratch that idea, I am going to look at my tach and find this resistor. From what I have read, the resistance value for the V8 tach is 200k. My guess at this point is the V6 is 150k and the 4 cyl would be 100k. So let me do a little bit of research on it, do it see if that is in fact the deal and then I can do the same to your tach if you would like. I am thinking of setting mine up so I can remove the resistor easily without resoldering it every time, just to fine tune it.

I am surprised you have not found a V6 cluster, cause where I live that is about all I ever see when I am looking.

Project 3.4 Camaro

Annoyingly I live in a city and theres no JYs around really, but I could throw a rock and hit one where I used to live probably, I didn't look in JYs tbh, looked on ebay and found what was supposedly a v6 cluster, but the buyer was dumb, and an ***, claiming it was a v6 cluster despite my irrefutable evidence it was not, his solution was sending it back at my expense, and I needed a gd cluster in my car for obv reasons, and broke the speedo on my old one accidentily.
I guess if the resistance has a direct linear correlation to the # of cylinders, that would take out the guess work of figuring out what resistor would be needed, would sure be nice to have a working tach, half the damn reason I bought the cluster, and I don't want an aftermarket one till I could afford a whole aftermarket cluster($700...) it always looks tachy to me when someone adds some out of cluster huge tach, even if I mounted it in the cluster it would bother me that it wouldn't match the other gauges at all. But spending $80 to have some specialty speedo shop fix it isn't worth it either.
At any rate, I might just try soldering in a 150, I imagine a resistor is pretty cheap, but I will have to refresh on the process.

x11nt4

A pack of resistors at radio shack are probably under $2. I was thinking of buying some push-in terminals so that I could solder those into the tach, then just push a resistor in. If it was off still I could just pull the resister and try another. In my case, since I have a V6 tach, and if it is lower than the 200k I saw posted for the V8, I thought about making a connector at the distributor that houses say a 50k resistor, then I would not have to mess with the tach directly.

Project 3.4 Camaro

Just had a thought or 2, idk if you have a potentiometer(I think thats the tool...) that you need to test resistance, but if you do, could you test what the v6 one is at, also thinking, we might not be able to trade tachs, but we could just trade resistors for the cost of a stamp and an envelope if that sounds good, I did get my tach pulled out, so I am deff going to do something with it, lol.
Especially since I finally bit the bullet and got my megashifter I've had sitting around hard mounted(ie. had to drill holes in things to get it to bolt in, (was from a 1st gen)) still have to get the cables and electronics hooked up to it, but the tedious part is done.

x11nt4

I found this post, and this explains what the values are. The tach in question is similar as what I have now. Have to look around some more but perhaps this will help

http://www.fieros.de/en/articles/tach.html

x11nt4

OK, I have you answer, I did some research and found a post on here which gave me a point to try and it worked. So here you go!

On the circuit board of the tach, there is a white IC with 2 black lines. This is a resistor pack that GM came up with to house most of the resistors.

Pin 4 and pin 10 are the 2 pins you want.

The resistance value of my V6 tach at those 2 points was 220K ohm. I had to decrease the total ohm to bring the V6 tach closer to actual rpm. Right now my total ohm is at 130k. So I would be interested if you could check yours across pin 4 and 10 with a DVOM and see what the resistance is of your V8 tach. That will tell me if I am in the ballpark here.

Since the lower ohm = lower tach reading. you will have to increase the ohm across the 2 pins. In my case I just soldered a 390k I had laying around to the terminals and achieved the 130k. Soldering directly (as shown in the picture) to 4 and 10 lowers the total resistance because you are adding a second path for current to travel. This is a parallel circuit. You need to cut pin 4 and/or pin 10, then solder a 220k resistor on the underside of the board to the terminals 4 and 10.

Here is the image that helped me figure this out



Hope this helps.