I'm just the opposite, I'm old too, but I can't stand white face gauges, they are too bright for me. I prefer the black face, just seems to be easier on my eyes, especially at night. Green is a pretty common color for dash lights, supposed to be easy on the eyes at night. At one time, you could even buy a tinted rubber sleeve from Mopar dealers to tint your dash lights. Don't know if they still sell them or not, haven't seen one in years. IMHO, SW gauges look great in anything! I put a set in my Lincoln in the original bezel, they look almost factory. I've got a old off brand tach that I've had for nearly 40 years, it's been in several different vehicles of mine. It's a half sweep, and the lettering nearly matches the SW's. I'm going to place it just above the speedo, it has it's own housing cup.
The black face looks way better. I also agree with the quality of the older SW. But, almost everyone of them has no provision for a light. Are you guys drilling a hole in the back to add a light? Does that even work with the way they are built on the inside? I'm not keen on adding an external light on the dash.
Is it me or is the speedo and gas gauge a little turned clockwise?... I wanna see with the new dash it will look awesome.
As it turns out, my fuel gauge problem was due mostly to shitty modern stewart warner mechanicals. How, you say? Stewart Warner supplies this as a sender: Note that the actual sending unit stays towards the top of the tank. This means that the float rod is very long. This creates a fulcrum and essentially makes the fuel gauge very sensitive. So, my gauge was sweeping between half full and full when going over even the slightest of bumps. Fuel slosh was essentially the culprit of this. Anyway, I decided to alleviate the problem by way of an autometer sender of the same ohm specs. This is the one I used: Note that Autometer sinks the sender deeper into the tank allowing you to use a shorter float rod. This decreases the fulcrum effect and as a result, my fuel gauge no longer sweeps due to fuel slosh. It's accurate and steady... That's what I think is going on anyway... In any case, I changed out the fuel sender to this autometer job after going over all of my wiring and grounds. The sender fixed the issue.
Getting ready to make an engined turned insert for the dash. In doing so, I had to make a template for f100 instrument panel. It occurred to me that others might need this as well. It's attached as a .ai file.
I guess these files are for the tech savvy computer nerd guys,old curmudgeons like me have a hard enough time just posting photos.. HRP
Say.... on your tach, is that thing adjustable? I have the Moon version and it reads too high. RPMs are actually lower than what the tach displays. I did not see anything on the housing which looked like an adjustment point. I may just swap it for your clean-looking Sun unit. Not sure I like the Moon logo on my gauge anymore. Your dash is a huge improvement but you knew that already.
Looks good Ryan. I have some older SW gauges that I switched out for the newer Wings gauges several years ago. I'm thinking about going back to the old ones. I like the green tinted bulbs, reminds me of how some the 50's -60's cars used to be. Thanks for the input on the Sun tach too, I have been looking at those for a while now but was afraid they were made by the same people who do the Moon tach. I haven't heard many good things about that one.
Just finished installing a Sun Retro tach in my 36. Did a column mount, (tach comes with dash mount and column). Had to modify the mount a little because it has a tilt for top of the column mounting and I wanted it on the side. Little work in the vise took care of the problem. Got the best deal through Autoplicity $109 plus $12 shipping. Never heard of them until I googled the tach. It's nicely dampened so no big swings in the needle like the old days just steady readings. So far I'm a happy camper.
Finally got around to doing an engine turned insert for my truck... It's a little over the top for a little ole' farm truck, but I gotta thing for gauges, so I cut myself some slack.
Did you do the engine turn yourself? That will make you cross eyed after about the first pass... Nice work, -Abone.
Beautiful craftsmanship Ryan. I worked in an aircraft machine shop for 14 years and have a real appreciation of just how much effort went into that panel. BTW, thanks for the HAMB! Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
are those sun tach's real steel? new gauges look great @Ryan Dig the 59 wheel they look really good done up two tone-
I had Ryan do a gauge panel for me last year after seeing the dash he did in his '38 and his steering wheel in the model-a. Came out perfect. Maybe a budding new career?
Thanks fellas... I didn't turn this one though. I actually bought the stainless "pre-turned" from FPM Polished Metals (an Alliance member)... Saved me about 8 hours worth of work and looks just as good as if I would have done it myself - probably better. I don't have the time to do much turning these days and like I said, this is just for my shitty old truck. Nothing special...
No, don't think so... They are steel... and really nice... I highly recommend them. The only shitty thing? They light up at night by way of a green LED. I've been meaning to take it apart to replace the LED on the board with a clear one...
I can't believe you didn't like the Auto meter gauges... kind of reminds me of the gauge board at O'Reilly's ha ha... your S&W's look great! Question... I have those Maring & Co. gauges we talked about a while back. They have no lights in them nor anyplace to put any. I bought some LED strips and used Gorilla tape and wrapped them around the gauges facing into the clear plastic piece on the barrel of the gauge housing behind the dash because I did not want to screw these gauges up by drilling holes in them. It added some light but not near enough. Do you know if anybody has drilled holes so to add the clip in light sockets? I would like to see what others have done to solve this problem before I randomly drill holes in these old gauges.
God. Those gauges are fantastic. If it were me, I'd very carefully cut windows in the case and then use some of these old elco light fixtures. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
great ok... do you think the light will make its way to the front.. my fear was that is would only shine on the back of the face. Does that sound stupid?
Think about even modern gauges with the snap in bulbs on the back. Essentially, the light just reflects off the inner case and eventually seeps through the edges of the face. In our case, it certainly won't be that bright or even but I think it will light the gauge. Man though... it would be scary cutting those cases on your gauges. I don't know that I could do it.
The Jalopy Journal
