Well, I finally decided on getting a shift light, and after looking at all of those monster tachs installed on people's dashes, I definately wanted a cleaner install. (Which reminds me, I have never understood the need for another tach, since most of the vehicles with them installed have one in the dash. But anyways...) So I bought a used Autometer Pro Lite from a guy on eBay, and the 7,000 RPM pill kit from a local store.
Here is what I came up with:
I think that the finished product turned out great! I kinda surprised myself with this one. It turns out that this shift light diameter fits perfectly in the stock gauge bezel, and since I installed an autometer water temp gauge in my pillar, I didn't need the one in the dash anymore. Unfortunately, the light length was a whole nother story. Please bear with me on the pictures. Some of them are a bit blurry. My camera skills leave a lot to be desired.
I don't know how many of you have ever had your dash gauge cluster out before, but the 5th Gen Prelude's is a single piece housing. That means that I had to figure out a way to either get all of the shift light in the housing, cut the housing, or cut the light. Below is a pic of the light and the partially dismantled gauge cluster. I drew a circle on the gauge cluster housing to show where the light needs to be.
I opted to do most of the cutting on the light, for a couple of reasons.
- There was no way in hell that the whole light would fit in the cluster.
- Cutting the cluster housing would be a major task because of the circuits on the back. After doing more investigating, I later realized that cutting the housing was no longer an option because one of the gauge cluster electrical harnesses plugs into an area that would need to be cut.
- It was cheaper than a new cluster if I screwed the pooch on the fabrication.
I started by pulling the shift light apart. It seperates into four pieces. The front housing, the rear housing, the mounting bracket, and the electronics assembly.
Here is a picture of the electronics assembly, (with added connectors):
At this point I knew what I had to work with, so I moved on to the gauge cluster.
The gauges are seperated into two main pieces. The left side includes the water temperature guesstimater, and the tachometer. The right includes the speedometer and the fuel gauge. Below is a picture of the left side with the water temp guesstimater already removed. I cut away the gauge face on the left side to expose the plastic behind it.
I then had to remove the clear plastic frame for the water temp guesstimater because it would be in the way of the shift light. Note that I had to cut the plastic just to the left of the lower mounting point of the whole assembly so it would still mount in the gauge cluster housing. You can see the 45 degree line that I scribed on the plastic above. That's where I cut. Here's a close up.
With the gauge modified, I moved on to the front piece of the shift light. It was going to have to be cut so that it would fit into the cluster and mount flush in the bottom of the cluster housing. I measured from each elivation in the circle on the cluster housing, (picture above), and marked the front piece of the shift light. Below are two pictures after the first couple cuts. Thank God for the dremel.
Now to try to get it all to fit. I found that the light electronics assembly would lay just under the the tach with the light bulb facing the left side. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of this, but it fit, barely. I routed the wires out the back through a hole that was already there, and used hot glue to hold it and the front light housing in place. Then it was just a matter of screwing the tach gauge back in, and snapping the bezel and clear cover on.
Here it is:
The last part was to do the wiring. On the light electrical assembly there are five wires. Red (12V +), Black (Ground), Green (Tach), White/Black (Pill Jumper), and White/Red (Pill Jumper).
- Red - fused to a 12V source fed off the ACC in the ignition. I ran this to my extra fuse block that I installed.
- Black - connected to a good ground. There are lots of places to do this. A good place is the center console.
- Green - connected into the gauge cluster wiring harness. I just had to identify the wire that is for the tach. It was identified by looking at circuit board on the back of the gauge cluster housing.
- White/Black and White/Red - these went to the pill block that is attached to the hounting assembly for the shift light. I relocated the mount to a place under the dash since it doesn't need to be readily accessable.
- Jesse
Linear Mode
