Gauges....

[Moosinatrix]

So, the guy I bought my engine from called me the other day to tell me he had found the ecu for the engine, as well as a few other goodies. Among these goodies was the PK1 ecu (can anyone tell me if this is a good one to have), a few sensors, and a guage set from the donor vehicle which he had pulled the motor. I was astonished to see only 132k on the odo. I was quite happy with that fact.

Donor vehicle is reported to be an 88 TC

after I got home I rifled through the goody box then decided I was gonna clean up the gauge cluster change bulbs and do a little modding to the lighting aspects of the cluster when I noticed that there was a little scorching on one of the circuits. I,m fairly certain that it it the ground circuit, trace it to find some serious heat damage under this strange bar with a coil wrap, al,ost resemble older style dimmer switch. This bar is bolted to the cluster in 2 places, along the back side of the speedo.

One end is bolted to the positive side of the lighting circuit, while the other end is bolted to the negative circuit. When power is connected to the lighting circuit, it heats up more then a littls, like a lot more, it has actually melted one of the circuits apart as well as exposed numerous others.

Now for the brain picking.....
What's the purpose of this coil wrapped bar? I played with it a little thinking maybe it is part of the dimmer, and as I slide the positive lead over the coil it does work as a dimmer, but the heat is tremendous, decided that probably was not something to continue doing.
So, as far as I can tell it's just there to burn up wires and put excess draw on the electrical system. Would it hurt anything to remove this? And what was it's original intended purpose?

Anyways I cleaned the cluster and repair the circuit the had been melted through, re position s the burning rod of mayhem so that it stands up and away from the circuitry, and carried on to my modding.

The mod.....
I have decided that I don't to much care for the color of the illuminated cluster, and after hunting everywhere in my shitty little town for colored LED bulbs to fit the sockets, I decided to go have a look at RadioShack. And by the way, radio shack has really petered out as far as the diy electronics components go,the selection was horrible and pricey. I was originally gonna go with blue for the illumination, but whilst digging through there drawers trying to find 12v led blue (nonexistent) I happened across so e that said "ultraviolet" and their light emisions were among the highest available, yet they were among the cheapest. I was intrigue by the idea of ultraviolet, and wonderEd if they wold be anything like a black light, at 1.99 for 2 I decided to take a shot in the dark, only downside was that their max voltage was 4v. So I few more drawer searches produced a 5.1v zener diode, an adjustable voltage regulator, an assortment or resistors, and a 1k ohm trimpot w/ 15 turn adjustment.

I don't know exactly how I'm gonna do it yet, but Im definitely equipped for the task.
Pictures coming soon

 

[Moosinatrix]

Almost forgot most inportant question.... will the gauge set from an 88 TC fit in an 88 ranger xlt?

 

[RonD]

Whats an "88 TC", all I got was Harley Davidson Twin Cam

But I would say no gauge clusters do not swap well across models.

Coil of wire, does dash have AMP Meter or Volt meter, if there is an amp meter then there will be an amp meter shunt, but usually in the engine bay, it is basically a coil of wire, a high amp resistor
It would just pass positive voltage, no ground, so wouldn't heat up.

Dash Light dimmer wouldn't heat up either, lights don't draw that many amps

PK1 EEC-IV is from a Mustang 2.3l turbo

Look here: http://web.archive.org/web/20110414065146/http://fordfuelinjection.com/?p=17

From that I assume 88 TC is turbo charged 2.3l Lima, from an 88 Mustang??

 

[4EyedTurd]

TC= Turbo Coupe aka Thunderbird Turbo Coupe

 

[Moosinatrix]

Pulled from a thunderbird turbo coupe

Sorry for picture delay, having issues with camera. I'll see if I can find a good picture online to represent what I'm saying.

 

[Moosinatrix]

This is the same guage cluster.
The item I described is on the left side of the speedo, in the shadow.

 

[Spott]

Not a chance. That cluster will not mount in a Ranger dashboard, it's a completely different shape and size. It's overwhelmingly likely that the electrical pinout is very different as well, because the Ranger uses 2 of those plugs.

It might be made to mount with custom brackets and a home-made bezel, and it might be possible to re-pin the connector to get all the gauges and lamps correct, but it would be a whole lot of work and you'ld probably lose some information because the TC cluster has fewer lights and gauges than a Ranger cluster.