<VV> Early speedometer (was Attrition)

[Tony Underwood]

At 04:58 PM 11/8/2006, Frank DuVal wrote:
>Plug the lights  back in their sockets before snapping the cluster 
>back in position.


Last time I tried this I fought, cussed, breathed in snorts, because 
the leads on the bulb sockets aren't long enough to allow this for 
about half the bulbs.    Likewise the cluster light wiring for the 
'62 ragtop here, Atwood's Spyder, my Spyder, and the red 
Lakewood.   All of 'em have those too-short little gray wires 
taunting you with their snottyness as you attempt to snap 'em into 
place...  get one in, pop another one out, etc ad nauseam.

FCs could well be a different story...  seeing as along the way I 
have never had to pull the cluster out of an FC.   But I've done 
plenty of early cars.


I'm likely to do as Terry suggested and splice extra wire into the 
bulb leads and THEN snap 'em into place with the cluster sitting out 
on the column.   ALSO the Gen and Oil lights, just as Evil.    Not 
much of an issue with turn signal lamps, seem to have enough wire on 
them.      I nearly did something like the splice-wire trick the last 
time I had the cluster out to replace the gas gauge a couple years 
ago, did it in the car, almost dark Sunday evening, so as to have it 
ready in the morning.



>I do agree with the bleeding part, and just worked on the dash 
>lights on a Rampside over the weekend. Removed cluster as it was 
>easier than bleeding....
>
>Who needs those pointers anyway....


The way the cops haunt I-81's "safety corridor" (where ticket fines 
are automatically doubled) through which I ride twice a day, *I* 
do.    Already went through a roundy-round in court recently for a 
speeding ticket I didn't deserve because of a speedo error... and VA 
State Police officers are a pretty high class and very professional 
bunch and their word in court is generally assumed by all to be 
verbatim of the facts and thus hard to contradict.

In fact, it was the cop in MY case who came to my defense in court 
and told the judge that I appeared to be as astonished as he had been 
when he told me how fast I'd been going when I passed 
him...  credibility in my case being demonstrated in that only a 
total moron ( I was pretending to not be a moron) will deliberately 
zip past a state police cruiser on the Interstate unless they 
honestly believed their speedo was NOT lying to them.      But I 
digress.      ...judge changed the speeding ticket to defective 
equipment and thus no points, I paid a non-moving violation fine and 
left the courthouse happy.   I don't wanna have to repeat this 
performance again, won't be as lucky next time.


I've since looked closer at the pointer in the cluster, blocking part 
of the odometer, and I noticed that evidently it still has part of 
the shaft attached to it, as if the meter movement shaft tip actually 
cracked off.    ??     I'll be checking around now for a speedo to 
fit the '60 cluster...  not sure if I have anything like this in the 
parts stash, nothing that's easily reachable or known to be 
accurate.    I *do* have one in a drawer in the den but it's known to 
be NOT accurate which is why it got replaced...

And seeing as how I no longer have access to speedo head calibration 
hardware...  I can't effectively-easily fix speedos anymore.




   ...Hey, Lew!     ...do you do many early speedos these 
days?    E-mail me an estimate to calibrate one that's about 20mph 
slow at 60...?    I'll be extending the dash light wiring when I put 
the cluster back together and reinstall.


tony..