I recently purchased a 1985 Targa 7 with a 12A rotary engine. I am surfing this site to find tons of helpful info. I need to get my speedometer working to safety my rx7 here in Ontario Canada. Is there a thread to show me how to get the speedometer working.

Thanks!

 

What's the status of your attempts? Is the cable actually connected to the tranny? It's attached to the rear of the transmission and almost looks like a deep socket. If it's connected then you can remove the cable from the tranny and slide it out of the sheath to make sure that the inner cable (the part that spins) is still in tact. I expect it's either not connected or else broken inside.

 

Uh oh.

Disconnected speedo cable means inaccurate odometer reading.

Hope you didn't pay a lot for a 'low mileage' car.

 

This was a $500 fix er up. Motor seems strong and body was painted a few years ago. How do I get at the cable? I am a novice but can be very handy. All other gauges work.

 

Jack up the car, right behind the engine is the tranny, right at the back end of the tranny is where the driveshaft connects. Near there, there's a cable coming off the tranny and leading towards the driver's side. You can usually unscrew it by hand or lightly use pliers. See if you can pull that out and check it's condition.

Also remove the gauges (Remove the steering wheel, and surrounding plastic near the gauges) and see if you can get at the other end of the cable back there.

 

On my '83 I reached up behind the dash and disconnected the cable from the cluster without unscrewing anything. I then reached back up there and reconnected when I had tired of enjoying my odometer reading 111,111.1 !

Just saying that you may not have to do a lot of work to check that end of the cable.

 

before pulling stuff make sure each end of the cable is pluged in, or attached or call it whatever. under the dash , on your back with a flash light look up as best you can to see if the cable is attached to the back of the guage cluster, and like pele said, jack up the car and look to make sure. chances are one end is not attached, odometer.speedometer....

 

Thank you so much, I will let you know how it goes. This site is great!!!

 

If you get on your back and under the dash, you can (on my 80) easily get your hand up to the firewall where the speedo cable runs thru and grasp it. If it feels firmly mounted to the instruments you know its either loose at the tranny end or shot. If the cable (again, talking about an SA 1980 model) isn't attached properly to the instrument panel, it just falls off, so a firm tug will tell the tale without dragging the instrument cluster out. Later FBs may screw onto the rear of the instruments, but on the 78-80 RXs they just "plug-in" almost like a phone jack, then you need to squeez a clip on the rim of the cable connector on the cable to release it from the back of the instrument panel-
Stu Aull
80GS
Alaska

 

They kept that design for a while... My 89 Mazda pickup has the same style cable.

 

Ya, my '84 GSL is the same way.