Hi all,

i have scoured the forums and have not found anything that is particularly close to what i am dealing with.

the tach and speedo stopped working last week, decided to take the car out anyways just to see if driving would help. Drove the car and at above 3K rpms, i believe, check engine light came on. Stopped immediately and towed the car home.

checked these forums and suggestions were to change the spark plugs, check the spark plug connectors and maybe use an obd-1 reader to diagnose the check engine light.

i changed the spark plugs, connectors look to be ok, could not really check them as they are underneath the car but maybe i will try this now with my phones camera and some cloth to just wipe out any junk, if there is any. Car fired up immediately so I assume that the connectors are fine. No check engine light, as expected however, i presume if i go over 3K, it will turn on again. I am pretty sure that all of this is interconnected, I am just not really sure where to start diagnosing what else it may be.

Any other advice of things to change or guesses of what may be causing this would be greatly appreciated.

 

You can check the code by following these instructions Check Engine Light Codes and if you have code 06, then it's the same thing that I went through a few months ago. My speedo, tach, odometer weren't working and it threw the CEL right around the same RPM. Nearly guaranteed to be failed capacitors on the cluster circuit board. Probably easiest to send it to one of the vendors recommended on the site in the threads about cluster repair (unless you're handy with soldering), expect to pay roughly 200 USD plus shipping.

 

Yeah get the code to register again and check the code. If the car is generally starting, running, and driving, it's 99% most likely it's not going to be anything major or that would impact engine life.

I highly recommend Michael Gagne in Canada for cluster repairs, he is on the Facebook groups primarily. Excellent fast service, quality work, and he has actually made a whole setup that lets him fully test a cluster so you know it's 100%. He also will replace things that WILL fail down the road with new parts so you will have a good cluster now and into the future.

Dale

 

Can you give any more contact info for Michael Cagne?

 

He is rarely on the forum. Best way is to get on the main Facebook RX-7 group (it's just called RX7) and look for him there. He posts fairly frequently.

And it's

Michael Gagné

Dale

 

Hey all, thanks for the quick responses. I got the check engine light to come on after a quick drive and by using the diagnostics box, found out the error code was 6 or Vehicle Speed Sensor. I believe that this code means either the wire for the speed sensor is bad or one of the capacitors on the cluster has gone bad, is that correct?

thanks!

 

That sounds right. The VSS feeds the speedo which I THINK then feeds the ECU. So if your cluster/speedo is not working then the ECU won't get the signal and will throw a code.

This is a VERY minor issue as far as driving the car. The car is 100% safe to drive.

But, get the cluster fixed. It's good to have it all 100%.

Dale