Hey Guys, need an opinion on something. I'm trying to save some money by doing things myself. Apparently the guy that owned the car did Tranny work on the car before I bought it. And I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it as I'm still learning stuff, but my spedometer needle starts at 55 not 0. It works, but when doing 55, it says I'm doing 110. Hahaha. Is there an easy way to reset the needle, maybe popping off the pin and setting it to 0. Any opinions would definitely be appreciated. I don't want to screw up the other dash components, so a lil reassurance would be nice. Haha.

 

Even if the trans is equipped with incorrect drive and/or driven gears, the reading would still be zero when the car was at a standstill. If at standstill, the speedo is reading 55, then I assume the PO fiddled with the needle (or the speedo head has gone south). Since the needle is 20+ years old, chances are you'll break it or bend the pin.

Good luck with the project.

JamesC

 

Damn, alright thanks for the input man. I was hoping to salvage the speedo since it does work, but I'll have to look into it a lil more. Thanks man.

 

When I drove it home for the first time, the speedo works but starting from 55, it said I was doing 110 when I was doing about 45 on the back roads. At standstill it is at 55, but it does work.

 

You can reposition the needle, but you would need to take the lens off of the cluster and either do it on a dyno or while driving . Got mine dead on while going down the Thruway on my way back from school in 07.

 

Not that hard to do once you get the cluster out and all apart. More than likely the PO had the needle off for some reason and didn't know how to reinstall it.

The easiest way to fix the problem is to gently push the needle back to the zero location while it is still on the gauge. It should stay there since the metal pin the needle sits on has no key-way, meaning it is smooth and will slide. Don't force it if it wont go though since you don't want to damage your speedo, but you will have to back it up to the zero mark. If this doesn't work pull the needle off the gauge by grabbing it at the base, then turn the metal pin it attached to back towards the zero location until it stops. Once it stops put the needle back on and try to get it to line up with the zero mark.

I have done this with Firebird speedos a lot, but they are electric not mechanical. Use some common sense and you should be able to fix the problem without breaking anything.