Anyone have experience with converting stock gauges to color, ie. silver or aluminum? Are OEM aluminum faces better than aftermarket? Any night driving issues?
Also, any advice on sourcing a 996 3-spoke
steering wheel for my 96 C4S? Thanks!

 

I converted my gauges to alum a few months ago. It was fairly easy.

There are no nighttime problems at all. The numbers on the dials light up very well. It also makes for a very good looking dash at night.

No driving issues.

As for the steering wheel, I would contact Gert at www.carnewal.com

I believe the homepage has the wheel you are looking for.

 

I had North Hollywood Speedometer convert the gauges on my 964 to white face (they also do silver). (964's have the same gauges as 993's except for the lack of trip computer in the tach). You'll see that the factory silver gauges have cut outs for the warning lights, which I find to be less aesthetically appealing. North Hollywood's approach is to silk-screen the entire face of the gauges, so that there are no cut outs. Since the silk screening is quite thin, all of the warning lights remain clearly visible through the silk screening. Do a search on the 964 board for "gauges" and you'll see pictures of Tom Sharpes's gauges, which were done by North Hollywood Speedometer.

As for visibility, at night the numerals in the gauges glow a vivid orange. The faces of the gauges range from silvery-grey to black at night, depending upon the level of ambient light in the car.

Good luck.

 

Hi J, do you remember how much they (N.H. gauge) charge for the conversion ? Thanks.

 

NHS charges $349 plus shipping. They take 3-4 days to do them. I had my shop remove them from the car and ship them to NHS by fed-ex. NHS shipped them back. One tip-- you do *not* need to remove the steering column/wheel to remove the tachometer. You need to pull the tachometer out slightly, and then rotate it 180 degrees to get it out. See the posts on the 964 board under "gauges".

 

I believe the speedo removal for the 96+ year cars is a bit more difficult, for what it is worth. From what I remember, there was a slight steering wheel column change from 95 to 96.