Greg86andahalf

Probably asked and answered many times, but will a broken odometer gear keep the speedmeter from working, or will it just effect the odometer?

Thanks,
Greg

Mike Schmidt

Just the odometer will stop working if the gear is bad. If the speedometer isn't working either, the first thing I would check is to make sure that the plug in the spare tire well is making a good connection. That plug is located under a plastic cover towards the front of the spare tire well.

Greg86andahalf

Thanks.

It's on my weekend "to do" list.

Ern

When my odometer broke, my speedometer stuck on 0 until I messed with the odometer. That made me think that they must be interconnected like the older mechanical ones. I am about to tear into mine and fix it. I hope I am right in my thinking and that I don't have another intermittant problem.

Ern

Chris Taylor

So, what do you do if your odometer gear is broken?? I can't just take it to my mechanic and have him fix it can I?

John Struthers

Chris,
Nope. Hit this site and update us on prices - more than you want to pay, less than you thought-, and post the site to your favorites list.
You can have the honors on the next odometer repair query.
North Hollywood speedometers
E-mail address: <a href="http://www.nhspeedometer.com" target="_blank">http://www.nhspeedometer.com</a>
HTH,LOL
Mike is there a hidden sensor/sending unit, whatever, other than the critter on the Tranny?
I cleaned up the connectors and lightly crimped the females for a snug fit. Then electrical taped the male/females together -pulling inboard from both ends-. Still intermittent... the pesky speedo puts up a hell of a fight! I am going to replace the board when I send the pod in for refit. Other than that I am at a standstill on this issue.
Hell-p meeee <img src="graemlins/crying.gif" border="0" alt="[crying]" /> <img src="graemlins/jumper.gif" border="0" alt="[jumper]" /> <img src="graemlins/cussing.gif" border="0" alt="[grrrrrrr]" />
John S. & Pattycakes

John Struthers

Chris,
Nope. Hit this site and update us on prices - more than you want to pay, less than you thought-, and post the site to your favorites list.
You can have the honors on the next odometer repair query.
North Hollywood speedometers
E-mail address: <a href="http://www.nhspeedometer.com" target="_blank">http://www.nhspeedometer.com</a>
HTH,LOL
Mike is there a hidden sensor/sending unit, whatever, other than the critter on the Tranny?
I cleaned up the connectors and lightly crimped the females for a snug fit. Then electrical taped the male/females together -pulling inboard from both ends-. Still intermittent... the pesky speedo puts up a hell of a fight! I am going to replace the board when I send the pod in for refit. Other than that I am at a standstill on this issue.
Hell-p meeee <img src="graemlins/crying.gif" border="0" alt="[crying]" /> <img src="graemlins/jumper.gif" border="0" alt="[jumper]" /> <img src="graemlins/cussing.gif" border="0" alt="[grrrrrrr]" />
John S. & Pattycakes

Mike Schmidt

Your mechanic can take the gauge out and send it to be repaired. You may not want to go to a Porsche service department for that though. I asked a Porsche service department who they use to repair gauges in customer's cars. They said that they don't repair them, they just replace the whole gauge with a new one.

Dan Bise

BTDT @ NHSpeedo. Bring them your whole gauge cluster, not just the gauge. I brought them my bare gauge (why bring them the whole cluster?, I thought) with a very cool protector with standoffs that I made out of a cardboard tube.

When they handed the repaired gauge back to me, not only was my nifty tube gone, the speedo needle was bent!

Also, check the worm gear that drives the nylon gear. My worm gear had a hairline crack that NHSpeedo neglected to fix (wull gosh, ya hafta replace the motor to fix that)...at first.

In the end, NH speedo made good on everything, but it took some hassling.

Dan
Pasadena, CA
'83S

John Struthers

Dan,
Thanks for the heads up!
If it is not to personal...What was the cost?
And how long did the initial repair take? Include shipping times if you went that way.
I just need a ballpark figure and time to see what else I can be tinkering with while the gauges are visiting California.
Thanks in advance.
John S. and Pattycakes <img src="graemlins/bigok.gif" border="0" alt="[thumbsup]" />

Dan Bise

I'm trying to think back a couple years, but I think it was $120, a flat rate. That's why I was miffed that at first, they'd only replaced a $2 gear for my $120 smackers. It took about three days for the work to be done and I hand-carried it in.

Anyhoo, DON'T tell 'em I sent ya. Hahah.

Dan
'83S

Greg86andahalf

Well, I pulled the speedo and checked the odometer gears. All gears were intact and in reletively good shape. The notorious gear was dark brown. (maybe a replacement?). All gears seemed pretty soft and none were brittle.

In any event, I noticed that the lubricant for the gears was tacky and made the gears turn stiff. I understand that in some applications, an amount of resistance is designed to keep gears from "rattling", but in this case, I see the tight truning as a problem. I have seen many small plastic gear applications where things stopped moving altogether and gears broke from hardened grease.

I disassembled the gears, cleaned the both gears and shafts, sprayed the gears woth a light coat of WD-40 and carefully added powder graphite (from my son's pinewood derby car kit)to the shafts.

The result is gears which turn freely and hopefully will prevent stress and breakage. I have not driven the car, but I see this as a better fix than waiting for the gear to strees and break.

Any thoughts?