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Installing a tachometer...

AliasJerk said:
provided you found a cluster from a 97-98 yes

I suggest people just find an after market tach, a small one like in the pic I provided, plus the glow gauges with the white HVAC and a white face tach looks really nice, at night its a really nice place to be the light glow is soothing i actually got a lot of complements on my interior in my old car.
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where do you get the glow gauges
 
Well, I found a 95-97 Mystique (has the rectangular headlights) 4 cylinder... I will be going back to the yard either later today or tomorrow to pull it :laugh:

Well, I pulled it... The date on the car was 10/96 I think, am I good?
 
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AliasJerk said:
It is a direct swap, just pull the cluster unplug the harnesses and plug in the new cluster, because all 95-98s had a tach wire running to the cluster.
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AliasJerk said:
There also should be a wire for signal, that goes to a wire on the cluster harness that is WHITE with a BLACK STRIPE
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The tach does not work but everything else does... I just looked at all the wires that are on the two connectors and there is not a white and black one... So where is this one and how do I connect it? Do I need to go back to the yard and cut the wires off of the other one?

EDIT: Ok, I just found the white with black one in the wiring that runs down on the drivers side, but it is definatly not on the connectors... Here are a list of wires from my connectors, so if you could tell me which empty space the tach wire goes to, that would be great...

Connector behind the tach:
16. White with Pink Stripe
15. Blue with Black Stripe
14. Blue with Yellow Stripe
13. Black
12. Orange with White Stripe
11. Black with Blue Stripe
10. Green with (something, I can not read my own hand writing)
9. Purple
8. SPACE
7. Orange
6. White with Red Stripe
5. Blue with Green Stripe
4. SPACE
3. SPACE
2. Purple with Orange Stripe
1. SPACE

Connector behind the speedo:
1. Black with Green Stripe
2. Black with Pink Stripe
3. Black with Yellow Stripe
4. Black with Yellow Stripe
5. Purple
6. White with Blue Stripe
7. White with Pink Stripe
8. SPACE
9. White with Blue Stripe
10. SPACE
(I think that is where the spaces were on the speedo side one, apparently I did not write them down)

EDIT: Ok, by looking at the back of the new IC, you can tell that on the Mystique there was a SPACE on tach side 1 / speedo side 8 and 10... So the tach must be either 3, 4, or 8, and whichever two it is not may *possibly* be for ABS and O/D lights, I can not remember if the Mystique had those... I guess I could go back to the yard and check the wiring against mine, although it is supposed to rain tomorrow, guess I will get wet, LOL...

So, if everything works properly except for the tach, is it a correct match? Like if I pulled one from too new a year would anything else work?
 
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Well I tested the circuits... On the tach side, space 8 is for the tach, space 4 is for Traction Control light, and space 3 is for the low coolant light...

EDIT: Ok, I just went to the yard and pulled the wire... The wire that I pulled is rather thin and is white with a black stripe on both sides... I was looking at the line of cables again that ran up to the dash, and there appear to be two white cables with one black stripe... One is thicker than the one I just pulled, and the second one is even thicker than that... So, which one is it? :shrug:
 
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I took apart the new cluster, keeping good photo documentation of everything... I should have pics of the final result tomorrow afternoon...

ClusterChange005.jpg
http://i108.photobucket.com/albums/n29/blackdog007/Cluster Change/ClusterChange005.jpg
 
HELP ME!

HELP ME!

HELP ME!!!

I tried hooking it up to three different "white with black stripe" wires and nothing... I need to know the exact location... On the other note, is there a way I can test the actuall tach itself? Please do not leave me hanging :help:

Maybe I am using too big of a wire? I am using 16 gauge, bigger than all the wires in the car, but that should not matter, right?
 
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Should I just connect the "signal" wire straight into the ignition coil / ICM?

The four wires are two red and two black. The red wire marked "trigger" goes through the firewall and is connected to the coil wire that goes to the distributor. The second red wire is the "hot" lead and is wired into the ignition wire where it goes into the fuse box, so that when the ignition is ON, the tach is ON, too.
 
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AliasJerk said:
bulb probably burned out.
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Yea, I am going to the yard today too... I need to get the rectangular screw cover that goes to the left of the steering wheel... Apparently that one will fit either of the rectangular places, but the one to the right of the steering whell oly fits that one... So since I moved the light for my alarm from the right side to the left side, it does not clip in... You would think it would have been easier for them to just make both of them identical :shrug:
 
Just for the fun of it, anyone want to do me a favor? Next time you are crusing down the highway, see if your revs are 3,000 when going 70 MPH... I just want to make sure it works right... It idles a tad below the 1,000 mark, right around 850 as it should... I just want to be 100% sure though :crazy:

EDIT: LOL, I was just reading the "archived forums" and saw this post by BrApple talking about if 4cyl. tachs. even existed...

on a side note the 4 and the 6 seem to rev the same, on the highway at 70 each pull 3 grand. the difference I see is where the 6 can pull in 5th around 2 grand in the 4 you have to downshift
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yup, thats about right, I believe the zetec hums away at about 2900ish RPMs while doing 70.

the stock tach isnt really that accurate, its common for people to complain about the tach being 100 RPMS off.
 
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