Hey folks, Just thought I'd share my attempt at installing a tachometer in the original clock location in the dash of my 72 Riv. I purchased a 2 1/16" Autometer tach and found that it fit perfectly within an original clock housing after adding holes in the back for mounting screws, lighting wires and operational wiring. The tach sandwiches nicely between the original clear plastic faceplate and the back of the housing. The pictures show the assembly almost ready to install. I'll add another picture after I paint the inside of the clear faceplate flat black around the tach. Hopefully, this will look ok when it's finished. Thanks to Joe Rivecco for supplying the donor clock.
Alright... I got some $0.88 flat black at Home Depot and here's the result. I still have the original clock. Check out the side-by-side. (Is that paint really flat? oh yea... $0.88...).
Although I prefer to have the clock this is a very nice solution. I still have some space left in a mini console to add a tach (besides the oil pressure, temp and volt gauge) , but the console is too far 'out of sight' for a tach IMHO
Yes, many would probably argue that a tach as small as mine isn't very useful. I may argue the same thing too after I drive it around for a bit. That's why wanted to keep a clock available to put back in. For now, it seems like the least invasive solution. I like your mini console with the "R" logo. I like your collection too. I never paid much attention to these big ol' 70's boats when I was a kid. Now, since they are mostly extinct from what you see everyday on the road, I really appreciate them. The styling just seems so interesting to me now.
Thanks Joe. All I need is to polish the plastic face a bit... The tach is pretty cool. It came with a green cover for the internal light. Should match my green interior pretty well. :TU:
I used Blue Magic Plastic Polish. This stuff is amazing to say the least. I never thought it would work but it really does!! The more you rub the better it comes. I did my 65 Skylark Speedo Plastic and I did it like 10 times and it really looks new!! Before I used it, it was scratched up pretty bad and was cloudy too. Btw I like the Tach in there. Looks good.
Joe, can you get that Blue Magic stuff at a typical car parts place or do you have to go somewhere special?
Doug I got it at local R+S strauss store. It's a small plastic bottle. Well worth getting. I also use it on my plastic Headlights and Parking lights. My Astro parking lights were almost yellow when I bought it, and now their beautiful!!:beers2:
That is my stock dash. General Motors used it on a few cars besides Firebirds. I know I've seen it on a stock Cosworth Vega. I don't know if you can buy it somewhere... but I wouldn't doubt it too much...
I did a very similar tach mounting in my '71 Riv. I cut a piece of common window glass to replace the plastic version. No clock adjuster stem hole now either.
Well... I am impressed, but I just HAD to go the extra mile to really be sold! I had lots of fun last night. Probably should have let well enough alone...ou: Here's the story. I took the face off so I wouldn't get any polish stuck in the corners. The Blue Magic work great! (the good news) However, while I had it apart again I wanted to get another coat of paint on the back of the plastic to make it more opaque (looked great in the pics, but if there was any light behind it would show through... this is the bad news by the way) Using the tach as a round template (like I did before) I hit it with a pretty thick coat of paint then let it sit to dry. When I picked it up an hour later the face was misted with white under the original paint!! (In other words, the back of the face, beneath the original coat of paint was had a frosted look) DAMN! I wasn't really sure what was going on so I tried to remove the paint to start again from scratch... but all the paint wouldn't come off and I realized that the plastic was screwed up. I guess the new paint worked through the dry paint and ate the plastic a bit (???). I tried wiping the paint off with Eastwood Pre Painting Prep (which I used to clean the plastic the first time) ... and this didn't totally clean it. Then I tried using a new razor blade... but this only made me more aware that the plastic was screwed. I ended up clearing all the junk off with 400 grit sandpaper. What a scratched-up mess. :ball: :ball: It looked pretty much like junk by this time. I was pretty pissed off but I decided to try to save it with a cd scuffing pad (from a CD scratch removing kit I bought some time ago) and lots of elbow grease with the Blue Magic stuff. Believe it or not it's looking pretty good again. I still need to smooth it some more but I can't believe that the Blue Magic is eating though the scratches that the 400 grit made. I really need to get some fine paper to bridge the gap between the 400 grit and the CD scuffing pad... but I'm really amazed that this piece looks like it will survive. Anywho... I guess this is a testimonial to Blue Magic and maybe more of a testimonial to Steve Schiebel's idea to ditch the plastic and cut a piece of glass to avoid the whole issue in the first place :rant: Crimmony...
