Designing a cluster gauge speedo backdrop

[a_ahmed]

So I got a question, you know how our speedos read 180km/hr and thats pretty darn slow in contrast to even modern famil ycars, and well there are aftermarket ones although they are pretty rare (euro one was 240km/hr, nismo one is 260km/hr and a tomei one if i recall was 280km/hr).

Well… the aftermarket ones are quite rare… HeatW got a nismo one which is nice…

Well I was thinking… how would one calibrate the speedo?

Say I can design (and I can) a 220, 240, 260, 280, 300, 320, whatever speedo… as im into media and graphics are a skill i have… and i had it printed out on metal (i forget what that process is called, done with a laser or whatever… i’ve had it done before on an amp my dad and his friend were designing, i designed all the front graphics, etc… and then they went to a guy who had them printed out with a laser method i forget the term for it)…

Well… I could theoretically then get a nice thin metal plate cut out and with my graphic printed out (a few prototype tests would be needed of course) but then how would i get the speedo calibrated to point the needle with the proper amount of rotation in contrast to the ratio of the speed on the backdrop?

I could have all the lines and numbers done equidistant, properly, and then have a final vector graphic file ready for laser print onto some thin black metal or silver or whatever… but… im not sure how i’d get it calibrated…

Just a thought… since aftermarket ones are quite a bundle…

I also thought about the digital cluster, it’s limited to 399km/hr or something, but its such an old school look… I thought of getting one then perhaps changing the displays, rewelding some newer style displays in place. None the less I still feel anoyed with the old font styling, white gauge needle, graphics, and so on.

Just personally I find the white on white (gauge on text), really outdated, plus the 180km/hr speedo limit lame since with it being a sports car especially if modified… a lil lame… plus since we are modifying and making our cars to our tastes… to modernize or spice up even little details like this are always nice…

I’m not talking about ricy trim kits that are put on the make ur jdm tyte carbon fibre… but serious little interesting and unique mods … this comes to mind… and I would like to do it… but I’m not sure how i would get it recalibrated… Electronics are not my speciality, so I’m not sure… I’m sure its some part or another that makes that difference and if its tinkered with… it would be in charge of determining the rotations in perspective to what the speed sensor does on the tranny… or are these things controlled through the computer?

It can either be in the speed sensor… some variable on the computer… or some component or variable on the cluster…

HeatW has a Nismo 260km/hr cluster… if its just the cluster that gets changed… then it must be a component or some kind of variable that gets calibrated on the cluster itself that determines the rotations… and well it seems common-sense to be on the cluster… im just not sure and honestly don’t know.

Anyways just some sleepless 4-5am brainstorming… dont mind the rant… shoot me some feedback/thoughts…

[BAS]

you need a blog dude…

[system]

@BAS

you need a blog dude…

Hahaha.

With the amount of $$ spent on designing and developing your own cluster you might as well go get one of those nismo or tomei clusters, they look great.

Ted (HeatW) might still have a Nissan NX cluster (I think) he’s rewired to work with 240’s if you wanted a full digital set.

If you wanted to go ahead with the whole designing your own cluster.

Materials: I’d reccomend you don’t go laser etched metal… how are you going to see the cluster at night? Have you seen what stock clusters are made out of? Just thin translucent sheets painted/printed black or white.

Illumination: You could go with a rear illuminated cut-out metal with some kind of diffuser to get the light even, but I think you’d need alot of bulbs to get even illumination. Take a look at the stock cluster, it has various clear plastic pieces to spread illumination evenly.

Needles: The 240 speedo is electronic, you could probably put some kind of resistor to change the voltage going to the needle to get the right speed. As for caibration, you could hookup a turn-knob type resister (somewhat like a light dimmer) to allow you to increase or decrease the amount of electricity going to the speedo. I don’t know if a part like this is available, and you’d need to do this while driving next-to another car to get the right speed.

I think this is a huge waste of time/money/effort, even me typing out possible solutions is a waste. The current cluster is fine, there are better/more imporant things on your car to spend your money on. I doubt that KA is going to be going that far past 180k.

Why do you need a speedo that goes above 339kph, who are you? Jason Muscat?

[S13GG]

wasn’t there a page on zeroyan that showed what resistor to wire in where to turn your 180km/h speedo into a 180mp/h speedo?

http://sr20forum.com/showthread.php?s=88d2947f166acb99a3d023ca283d61a0&p=1310880#post1310880

http://www.zeroyon.com/index/content/view/20/47/

google search that wasn’t SO HARD

[system]

Meh to much work if you ask me just for a cluster

[Fobwall]

@mikeness

Why do you need a speedo that goes above 339kph, who are you? Jason Muscat?

Why are you making fun of me?

[a_ahmed]

lol no no, i just said that i was trold that the digital cluster goes to 399km/hr or whatevber.

If I made one I’d make something like 320km/hr, it’s pretty fit for a modern supercar/sports car

Hmm good point about illumination… kind of forgot about that…

Well I just thought it’d be a fun project to explore.

[spd-dmn]

I think I’m going to take out my old ugly turn signal stalk and replace it with an S15 unit.

Does anyone know how I can do this?

[jammin1911]

^^

i think i have enzos phone # around here somewhere…

[S13GG]

@a_ahmed

If I made one I’d make something like 320km/hr, it’s pretty fit for a modern supercar/sports car

.

are we talking about an S-chassis here? supercar? did yours come with a cape and underwear outside its tights?

[Fobwall]

[quote=“S13GG”]

@a_ahmed

If I made one I’d make something like 320km/hr, it’s pretty fit for a modern supercar/sports car

.

are we talking about an S-chassis here? supercar? did yours come with a cape and underwear outside its tights?[/quote]

Mine did. It’s purple too.

[S13GG]

@birdhou53

[quote=S13GG][quote=a_ahmed]
If I made one I’d make something like 320km/hr, it’s pretty fit for a modern supercar/sports car

.

are we talking about an S-chassis here? supercar? did yours come with a cape and underwear outside its tights?[/quote]

Mine did. It’s purple too.[/quote]

purple? the cape, tights or the underwear?

[a_ahmed]

well i guess this forum is good for one thing talking trash and pointless idle chatter.

I guess I could of course reply in response to each lil dumb thing you people say but hey why bother lol, it’s like talking to a buncha high schoolers. The brains don’t function and the words just keep coming out, achieving absolutely nothing except stupidity.

Last time I checked most modern sports cars including supercars (such as ferararis, etc…) have 320km/hr or so speedos or more.

Anyways like I said, why even bother, at the ned of the day you’re acting like a buncha idiots for no apparent reason.

lol grow up. You don’t want to partake in this, you don’t have to even respond. If you find it A. satisfying to have the cluster you have fine B. Find it unecessary for your car personally fine C. Think it’s not possible, well keep to yourslef and finally D. you think it’s ‘stupid’ well, so was the idea of building a bugatti and people kept dissing it until it finally was finished.

Point is, if you don’t got useful shit to say, don’t at all.

In fact hell with it, why did I even share my thoughts about it, wrong place to ask, I guess more mature forums like NICO or some other Nissan or 240sx forum with a DIY section would be smarter. People who actually produce something rather than trash talk every chance they get.

I don’t know, to me the old style cluster is a bother, to you it may not be. Simple really lets leave it at that. I think the stock cluster is ugly shit, and would like to change it or modify. That’s all.

Live with if you must. I just foolishly thought that as a car club perhaps people could do things together, including DIY projects however minor or major, hell bings does a full multi link set, and everyone’s digging it, although some people useless biiitch about the aluminum ones, etc… here I thought as a group together we could come up with a neat lil mod that others might have not come up with.

Ah just forget it… and if I do it, I don’t think I’ll share it honestly to an imature crowd…

[Original_Nutta]

damn you talk alot.

[a_ahmed]

I was also told about defi clusters, but I heard they are expensive… I don’t exactly find them that attractive though, and really tiny, interesting though

[spd-dmn]

Why don’t you first try to produce something? Other members on this board have produced amazing custom products, including but not limited to custom gauge clusters from other cars modified to fit in the S chassis.

You still haven’t answered my question: Does changing the background from black to grey bring our highly antiquated clusters up to modern spec? Do you think you are accomplishing anything by trying to recalibrate the speedometer for 340km/h? Won’t that be awesome?? People can drive their cars without ever having the needle surpass half of its sweep.

Perhaps what you are failing to realize is that this board is not, for the mostpart, really concerned with nonsensical subtleties such as which hue adorns the background of our gauges.

If you’re into that kind of stuff, then by all means the prerogative is all yours. Instead of getting offended, why don’t you make something and prove to us that you know better.

Believe you me, we won’t lose any sleep over the thought of missing out on “custom” 180SX gauges.

[Axlerod]

Look man, don’t come in here all hurt when people don’t take you seriously. You’re not getting serious answers because your ideas are impracticable.

We realise you’re a friendly guy who is just trying to see what’s possible with your new car, but you’re not the first guy to come here and ask stuff like this. We’ve all seen your many threads asking opinions and suggestions on every aspect of your car. Many of us have been here for years and we know our cars inside and out. Most of us learned what we know by lurking, reading, and trying it ourselves. So when someone comes along asking to be spoon fed, we act like this to encourage you to find out for yourself, which we call have found out is the best way.

As a club we’ve come to gether to accomplish a lot of things since our inception, so don’t presume to rag on us when we aren’t enthused about helping you make an opaque speedo bezel that reads 100km/h faster than your car will ever go.

This is our board, and we don’t owe new members anything. If you want respect, then do something to earn it.

[Original_Nutta]

Yeah, buying the admins beers and burgers helps too.

[a_ahmed]

Man what is this, every new post you put words in my mouth? wtf is this?

Did I say “neon glowing”, “reverse contrast” or whatever speedo? No.

Point of this thread was to find out how to calibrate the needle so that it’s respective to the speed ratio on the backdrop, if one is to create a different speed rating, or perhaps make a new rev range for the rev meter.

If you want this kind of crap:

Ebay already has plenty and every ricer mobile honda has one.

Making the speedometer from 180km/hr to 240km/hr or 260, or 280 or 300 or 320 is a little different to the thing above.

Who does it? I don’t know many people who have, except companies who already sell premade ones that go for quite a bit of bling and are a rare catch once in a while eg; tomei, nismo, zsport (at least I saw theirs in 300zx and skylines), etc…

And second, I thought it’d be a fun thing to share with the rest of the ppl who MIGHT be interested in getting a better speedo than the stock one, versus biitching and trash talking which does NOT produce a relavent discussion nor help anything get done!?!

What would you prefer in your car out of this:

vs.

Although the above is for a R32.

If you wish to retain the stock one that’s cool, alright… but why biitch? If someone might be willing to try to make something like this and migh task for advice from others that might have done it or might want to do it, just for the fun of it if not anything else. I like DIY type stuff, you don’t aight, that’s fine.

Which would you prefer though? Don’t be a smart ass and say the stock one.

This isn’t about flashy shit or JDM tyte omgomg neon glowing led crap what so ever so don’t put words in my mouth cause i hate ricery shit. It has a purpose and practicality, 180km/hr limit on cluster, old look, etc… versus rare and pricey aftermarket ones made in Japan by tomei or nismo, etc… usually discontinued and used, and imported then sold on ebay or some JDM tyte advertising shop that makes mad bling from used crap, sometimes useless and broken crap that’s labeled “JDM imported” ebay sales.

[Solarian]

Hey Enzo, where’d you find the clear red paint you were talking about for the needles? And how did you apply it, they don’t seem to come off of the gauge cluster?