I'm having my dash pad modified by "Just Dashes" to hold 3 instruments.. My question to everybody is; besides the obvious water temp, and oil pressure, what would you put in the third hole? I'm thinking.. Tranny Oil Temp Cylinder Head Temp Engine Oil Temp Vaccuum Guage. Voltmeter. What would you do, and why???
whats your use of the car? the trans temp gage is really good to have if you have a higher than stock stall converter. cylinder head temp is really not nessary unless your really fine tuning the motor for performance. engine oil temp is good if your doing open track racing, autocross, or really agressive driving for a extended period of time. a vaccuum gage is good for helping with geting gas mialage and can expose some motor mechanical problems if they develop. a volt meter is help full if you do watch it, but a idiot light works beter at telling you that you are not charging. how are they giveing you third gage hole? you must show pics when done.
Daily Driver... 200 I6 ..lol. All good answers.. suggestions.. Here is the Co.'s web address for the mod. http://www.justdashes.com/GuageDashPad.htm I'll post a pis when done. THe told me Mid December that they'd finish mid JAn '08 now they tell me end of Feb... We'll see if it's worh the wait. $600.00 It's a lot but I really hate tacked on guages.
Yeah, that's gonna be rather sexy, can't wait to see pics of the new dash... As for the third gauge, my vote is ammeter. I know everybody says they're evil and will burn down your car, but I that's the kind of thing that happens when the gauge is defective, old, or wired wrong. Just don't let any of those three things happen and you should be fine. I like an ammeter because I can see when my draw is more than my charge, and I can see when my alternator or voltage regulator isn't doing its job. A voltmeter won't tell you about a charging system failure until it's caused a voltage drop, and by then you're probably gonna need jumper cables if you turn it off. Also, knowing how the ammeter typically behaves, I was easily able to tell a couple of weeks ago when my battery had failed. I knew the ammeter should have been on the charge side for longer than it was, no way was the battery charging that fast. Sure enough, battery was hosed. Without the ammeter, I would have assumed "bad alternator" right away and wasted time diagnosing it, because it was otherwise acting like a textbook alternator problem. With the car off, an ammeter will also tell you if you have a short in your system before it drains your battery, or worse. A voltmeter has its place too - many people use one instead of the other, but they do two different things. Whatever you decide to do though, my personal opinion about essential gauges (since you asked ) are - oil pressure, water temp, and either volts or amps, at minimum. 'Cause those are three of the four major causes for getting stranded on the side of the road, and you've already got a fuel gauge... PaulS's water pressure idea is brilliant, too. I could have used that a couple of times.
I did it on my Coronet instead... Pics attached. It is soooo bitchin. But it is too out of charactor for my Comet..I finally got the gauges for the Comet. Five total, all 2-1/16" Autometer Z series. Tach, Oil pressure, Water Temp, Tranny Temp, Digital Volts. I'm going to attempt to create recessed pods in the place below the dash pad where the AC vents would be if it were an AC car. I will be striving to recreate the same look as the original two Speedo and Instrument pods, behind the wheel. Imagine 5 mini pods sunk into the curved panel, with the silver trim... as if it was stock. This will be a serious challenge.. stay tuned.. Going where no Mav Comet has gone before.....
