feel free to ask any questions.

 

Damn, great job on having big *****, are you actully replacing the leds for red ones?

 

not as of right now. if i do replace them, i will do Blue and would need new guage faces more than likely. but that will be in a few months. i took it apart b/c i'm getting a new pod on monday, so i figured i might as well go ahead and "sacrifice" mine for the good of the Z community.

 

wow....great pics. looks like the leds are permenantly soldered onto the speedometer board. so even if the leds could display a different color than orange, the chip would have to be reprogrammed.

 

Are you getting a new but equel pod, or is it an aftermarket, or you mean like the aluminum gauge face?

 

not necessarily ajk, if you could somehow get the LED's off the board, and soldier new one's straight on, making sure that the ratings on the new led's matched the stock leds somewhat, you wouldnt need to reprogram. the problem is, A) i have no clue how to detach the LED's, B) i dont think i could complete the job without somehow damaging the board. overheating with iron, dropping, scratching, the list goes on. i wonder who will be the first in the world to do this for the Z. hmmm....

 

What can I say besides YOU > ME. This will facilitate my project nicely. Since you helped me I will help you a la the DIY super picture thread LOL.


Andrew, do you think we will need a different film for the light to shine through, or could we just sand it off like accordfreak?

thanks again, peace.

ravi

 

awesome pics twinturbo. goodluck on the project. (btw i replied about soldering on the other thread)

 

oh btw.. can you list how many leds is behind each gauge? like how many leds lights up the speedo, how many leds lights up the tach. etc etc. thanks!

 

Wow, sorry to be nosy here but you 3 guys accordfreak, GQ 350z, and 350zTT... have something great going on in here. I bet the three od you could make something great out of this, and probably even make some money. Peple every wher like custom dashboards like the one accordfreak has in his g35, for the Z it would be a a hit.

 

@castro - i'm getting a brand new, OEM pod installed by the dealership.

@GQ - the actual face shines through amber with white light. can we "sand" it off? i dunno. didnt try man. i would say probably so. try it on a small part of your dash when u open it.

@accord - from left to right
Fuel - 1 amber, 1 red
Temp - 1 Amber, 1 red
Tach - 3 amber at 9,12, and 3 oclock, 1 red
Speedo - 2 amber, 1 red
Mileage LCD - 4 amber

 

Ok awesome--I sent an email to my electrical engineering professsor, and hopefully he will help me with this--especially the draw of each led etc--I'm not trying to mess up a $800 part.

With your guys' help I'm sure we can get this done. I'll post more info as I find out.

350tt, where do the bulb like led's belong to in this link http://home.comcast.net/~icephantom/0984.JPG


Little by little, but we'll get there, I promise.

ravi

 

Btw, thre should be no programming involved--there are no logic gates telling what color to turn on. As long as they blink they are doing their job.

ravi

 

GQ that part is to the buttons on the side. the ones that control the panel dimmer and then the digital read out. they illuminate the buttons.

 

can you do a short/quick HOW-TO take out this gauge pod because i want to paint them.

Thanks

 

uh, well just follow the pics. they are in order of being taken apart. just unscrew the screws, and ur set.

 

WOW, great pics. Love the ones with the cluster back in...but the face plate off.

 

nice... this should be a kickass project

btw... anyone else think this looks like a star wars ship:


and this looks like mickey mouse ears?


looks like nissan engineers were animation/scifi fans

well THAT, or i need to cut down on the caffeine in the morning...

 

I think the hardest part to making this happen would be getting a new gauge face made, one without the amber on it, since it appears from the photo to go all the way through. Not something that could be taken off with nail polish remover, and would taint any color LED you put in. As far as other color LEDs, you could find them in that same packaging (shape), depends on how hard you want to look. For harder to find items, try digikey. I have a few other sites, just not off hand. Besdies that, the polarity indicators are right there, all you need now is a decent solder guru, and you're set. I'd do mine, but right now, the wife won't let me touch it. If you want to be adventurous, I do have a few suggestions (I've been soldering for 8 years now just about daily). You will need a good solder station setup, the old 40 watt iron and manual solder extractor will not cut it here, you'd likely burn the board. A good variable power supply on your iron and a vacuum assisted extractor, along with 63/37 solder (in and out faster). The only other thing I could suggest would be a steady hand. It wouldn't be difficult, the only fear you'd really have is your own competence level in doing the job.

 

you got some big kahnua's man... big ballllss... great job of taking pics step by step and posting em here... just made a nice pdf of it.