Mongo

Hey guys, I've lost my patience with my gauge cluster. My oil pressure gauge needle now bounces like it's had a sip of my coffee in the morning. The coolant temperature gauge does the same thing. I've decided to remove the instrument cluster to clean the grounds back there since this could be the case. I have replaced the oil pressure sender right next to the oil filter so I know that is not it.

Any recommendations on what to use to clean the gauge cluster? Would di-electric grease on the connection spots be a good idea too to resist any corrosion or particles that would disrupt proper conduction to maintain a consistent reading?

A question also for you guys that have removed the clusters. Do any of you have pictures of where the oil pressure and coolant senders are on the back of the board and the spots I should clean? I'm a little new to this part of the car.

The DareDevil

Here is a good article about cleaning the guages:

http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarti...e_problems.htm

Mongo

Thanks Daredevil

When my odometer gear was fixed I found out I didn' thave to remove the steering wheel to take off the cluster. I'll try it that way first, but I have the sockets to remove the wheel just in case.

jonnybgood

I followed the pelican article Derek posted. I used scotchbrite I think. You have to remove several 6mm nuts to clean the flexible circuit contacts. I did not use dielectric grease. All the analog gauges have little motors to drive the needles. There will be 2 nuts on a diamond shaped plastic piece. Remove the nuts and remove the plastic bracket to get to the areas to clean. It is the leads on these 2 nuts that supply the voltage for the gauge motors. So the motor leads for the oil pressure motor will be directly behind the gauge.

This procedure improved my instruments and stopped them from jumping around.

75ohm

If you're taking apart your cluster to clean it, use something a little more robust and applicable then alcohol... perhaps a CRC cleaner such as precision CO contact cleaner, formulated for such applications.

http://www.crc.co.nz/item_prod.asp?pid=184

Vjgtrybno1

I had inquired aabout the location of the OP sender in another thread. Thanks, Mongo!

AndyK

Grounding strap? What is this?? Otherwise, seems pretty easy.

Mongo

I didn't use a grounding strap last night installing the chip on my car. I simply wore flip flops, jeans and a T-shirt, but touched everything metal around me on my work bench before I worked on the DME. I guess that grounded me out. I'll do the same thing.