Tired of poor lighting of the needles on your indiglos...here's the solution
Tired of poor lighting of the needles on your indiglos...here's the solution
I've been asked to do a write up on how to have those nice looking reverse indiglo gauges and still be able to see the needles.
First and foremost.
1)
Install the gauge faces. It is during this point that you may wish to paint the needles. I painted mine Day-Glo orange to match the autometer needles and to give the best chance for visibility.
1A)
The needles remove with a little heat from a hair drier and a small pry tool of your choice. Take careful note of how the needles are positioned (ie..run car at temp and take a pic at idle). The speedo and tach can be placed on and moved by hand to get to the correct position. It's the aux gauges that you need to worry about. There is a little bar that the needle's pin goes through. You'll see what I mean when you pull it out. As a warning, I have yet to get my boost gauge to work correctly after removing its needle. You may want to paint that one as an assembly.
2)
Take a dremel and remove a little material from the backside of the needle to compensate for the weight of the paint. How much? Don't know, not even really sure if it matters. Did it to mine and it worked just the same as before and nothing was scientific about it.
3)
Reinstall needles and route the indiglo wiring through any nearby holes. I came out the top. You may have to drill through the white plastic as the ends of the plugs may be too big to fit through the printed circuit board holes.
4)
Next, go on ebay and buy a set of these in the color of your choice. I picked blue because it matched the blue indiglos and lights up the needles almost like a black light.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...category=33713
5) Then install them into the gauge housing like so
Close up
Other side
I pulled the cardboard off and covered the inside of it with tin foil. This will increase the reflectivity as well as defuse the light a little with the crinkles that will most likely be in it.
6)
Now to wire everything up.
The transformer for the indiglos is going to want a constant 12v source that is turned on when the park lights come on. DO NOT WIRE TO 12V on the dimmer...bad for the transformer.
Your aftermarket gauges and the aux LEDs can be wired to the red/green wire next to the white/green wire on the headlight switch (see thumb
). The constant 12v for the transformer can be seen in the back..looks like it's the red/black wire..if someone can confirm...that'd be sweet. If you have a voltmeter it doesn't hurt to double check. You can see the one wire with just tape on it...yeah that wasn't the power wire I was looking for
7)
Try to bundle all the wiring up nice so it can stuff back in the dash. You'll also need to find a ground. Any piece of metal or bolt (that bolts into metal) should do the trick. I used a stud just to the right of the gas pedal. Although this is the location that all of a sudden didn't work. Could have been dirty/loose or whatever. Just to be safe I ran another ground wire from that stud to one of the 4 bolts that holds trans tunnel cover plate down.
Remember to solder everything and use shrink tubing when you can or a good quality electrical tape...I use 3M.
8)
Before you reinstall the dash, test everything out. Double check nice tight connections and you're done. Nice looking indiglo gauges with needles you can see.
Whole car can be seen here.
http://www.teamfc3s.org/forum/member...iew&car_id=307
First and foremost.
1)
Install the gauge faces. It is during this point that you may wish to paint the needles. I painted mine Day-Glo orange to match the autometer needles and to give the best chance for visibility.
1A)
The needles remove with a little heat from a hair drier and a small pry tool of your choice. Take careful note of how the needles are positioned (ie..run car at temp and take a pic at idle). The speedo and tach can be placed on and moved by hand to get to the correct position. It's the aux gauges that you need to worry about. There is a little bar that the needle's pin goes through. You'll see what I mean when you pull it out. As a warning, I have yet to get my boost gauge to work correctly after removing its needle. You may want to paint that one as an assembly.
2)
Take a dremel and remove a little material from the backside of the needle to compensate for the weight of the paint. How much? Don't know, not even really sure if it matters. Did it to mine and it worked just the same as before and nothing was scientific about it.
3)
Reinstall needles and route the indiglo wiring through any nearby holes. I came out the top. You may have to drill through the white plastic as the ends of the plugs may be too big to fit through the printed circuit board holes.
4)
Next, go on ebay and buy a set of these in the color of your choice. I picked blue because it matched the blue indiglos and lights up the needles almost like a black light.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...category=33713
5) Then install them into the gauge housing like so
Close up
Other side
I pulled the cardboard off and covered the inside of it with tin foil. This will increase the reflectivity as well as defuse the light a little with the crinkles that will most likely be in it.
6)
Now to wire everything up.
The transformer for the indiglos is going to want a constant 12v source that is turned on when the park lights come on. DO NOT WIRE TO 12V on the dimmer...bad for the transformer.
Your aftermarket gauges and the aux LEDs can be wired to the red/green wire next to the white/green wire on the headlight switch (see thumb
). The constant 12v for the transformer can be seen in the back..looks like it's the red/black wire..if someone can confirm...that'd be sweet. If you have a voltmeter it doesn't hurt to double check. You can see the one wire with just tape on it...yeah that wasn't the power wire I was looking for 7)
Try to bundle all the wiring up nice so it can stuff back in the dash. You'll also need to find a ground. Any piece of metal or bolt (that bolts into metal) should do the trick. I used a stud just to the right of the gas pedal. Although this is the location that all of a sudden didn't work. Could have been dirty/loose or whatever. Just to be safe I ran another ground wire from that stud to one of the 4 bolts that holds trans tunnel cover plate down.
Remember to solder everything and use shrink tubing when you can or a good quality electrical tape...I use 3M.
8)
Before you reinstall the dash, test everything out. Double check nice tight connections and you're done. Nice looking indiglo gauges with needles you can see.
Whole car can be seen here.
http://www.teamfc3s.org/forum/member...iew&car_id=307
Last edited by cbrock; Mar 6, 2004 at 10:59 AM.
Rotary Enthusiast
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 828
Likes: 0
From: ct
I did the same thing but I did it a little easier. What you do is take the spray can and spray some in a disposible plastic cup then get a fine paint brush and just paint the needles easy as one two three ,makes it so you don't have to remove the needles,orange lumi glo craft paint is hot.........
Round&Round not Up&Down
Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,805
Likes: 0
From: West Bloomfield, MI
I did something similar when I installed my new gauge faces. I found some LED's that fit around the base of the needle and it looks like this at night:
Sorry for the blurriness of the pic, but that's the best the camera would do. I posted the procedure either on here or teamfc3s a while ago when I did it. It wasn't easy, but well worth it in the end.
Sorry for the blurriness of the pic, but that's the best the camera would do. I posted the procedure either on here or teamfc3s a while ago when I did it. It wasn't easy, but well worth it in the end.
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