6. Interior Related

Installation of white-faced gauges add a nice touch the dark interior of the 4th generation F-Bodies. But you have to be sure the new gauges are properly set so accurate readings are displayed. Before taking anything apart, drive your car around until it reaches normal operating temperature (take note of how long it took to get there) and make sure your gas tank is full. Then with the car still running, park and record the reading of all gauge needles on a diagram of the dash board. Record the temperature reading first as the car will heat up after you park, and then records the rest of the readings.

Now it's time to disassemble the dash board. Remove the panel under the steering wheel (about 2 bolts and 2 screws). Remove the radio frame (about 4-5 bolts with 3 of them inside the glove compartment. Remove the A-pillar plastic covers from both side of the car (no screws, just pull them off). Remove the top cover (panel) that sits behind the dashboard (no screws, just some Velcro holding it together). Be careful not to break this piece. Then remove the screws that hold the dash together (about 5 or 6 with 2 of them close to the windshield and hard to reach). Now you can take out the dash.

Next, remove transparent plastic gauge cover (all little screws). This provides access to the gauge needles which you can remove with a flathead screwdriver by placing it under the base of the needle and wiggling it around until the needles pops out. Prying on the needle from various angle makes the process a lot faster and easier. You also have to remove the other screws on the dash, so you can take the black gauge cover off. Once that is removed, you have to peel off the original gauge face using a flathead screwdriver to initially get under the plastic piece. Enough glue should be left on the dash base to properly adhere the new white face without any extra glue. Make sure you place the new face exactly where the old one was. Also make sure you peel off the plastic film on the face of the new gauges.

Place the black gauge cover back on and put the speedometer needle and let it drop down to its base. Finish installing the other needles, but don't worry about placing them in the right position at this time. Now with the rest of the dashboard still apart, drive the car around for the same amount of time as it took previouslt to get it up to normal operating temperature. Park, turn the car off, and pry all the needles off (except for the speedo) with your screwdriver as you did before. Then start the car up again, and using your diagram, place the needles in the same position as you noted on you diagram. Press firmly on the base of the needles so they don't fall off later. Then turn off the car making sure the needles do what they did prior to installation (i.e. returning to zero/rest). Then start up again, going for a ride with the dash still apart to make sure the needles are operating properly. Finally, park the car and reinstall the rest of the dash pieces in the reverse manner from they were removed.

Thanks to Claudio Almeida (claudio@kct.com).

Since all the 1995+ cars have 16 pin PCM connections (where they were only 12 pin connections in prior years), you can still possibly use an older on- board system which measures performance. The following instructions pertain to such a conversion using the Auto-Xray system:

          --------------------
          | A B      D E     |
          | M                |
          --------------------
         12 Pin Auto-Xray Cable

                     
          --------------------
          \ 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8  /
           \9 A B C D E F G /
            ----------------
         16 Pin PCM Connection
     (A-G actually labelled 10-16)