Instrument light level improvement - my story

[rhdowns]

So I found this nifty article:
http://www.73-87.com/7387garage/interior/dashlights.htm

Decided to give it a try since I needed to lube my speedometer cable to stop it from making an annoying noise when it was cold.

The dashpad in my truck had been redone so I ended up having a few issues with it and found that one of my screw in spots on my instrument clusters was missing.

Anyway got the front plastic panel off, then the clear plastic part then couldn't figure out how to get the dash out. Finally figured out it was the speedo cable holding it in so removed the left vent and the duck so I could reach up in there and push the tab and unhook it. Then the entire cluster came right out.

I removed the bulbs all of which were original and some of which were burned out. I had issue at Wal-mart trying to figure out which bulbs I needed. The computer called for 161, 168 and 194. The only difference in the 3 are the watts rating. Autozone had no better answer so I just bought all 168's because they were the highest watts. I later looked close at the bulbs I pulled out and most of them were labeled 168 no matter if they came from the turn signal or just the regular back lighting area.

Next issue was I could not find chrome paint - the krylon and rustolem metallic is not shiny like the lid as he says in his article and do not produce the affect you are going for. Autozone didn't have any and two Walmarts had none in Hardware or Automotive. I ended up buying Scotch tape that was metal reflective. That ended up being a huge pain and took a couple hours to cut and paste in all the pieces of tape to cover all the areas needing covered but I needed to get my dash back together so I went with it.

Couple tips - when taking the bulbs out I was like how am I going to get these ones down in the holes out - I have skinny fingers but come on....then I had my ah-hah duh moment and figured out the thing that holds them in unscrews from the back of the cluster. Second tip bend the dumb metal frame to make it easier to get the cluster in and out - I broke one of the clips trying to get it in because it was caught just below the water temp gauge on the metal frame of the truck. It is alluded to in one of the articles I found on the web about replacing your gauges and just bending it a tad made a world of difference for me.

When I got everything back together I have noticed it is brighter - not like super awesome brighter but better.

One issue I found that may be related to the bulbs I got - when my head lamps are on and I turn on my turn signal they blink kind of slow. If I turn the lights off the turn signal speeds up. I'm guessing it is drawing too much power when all the lights are on?

I'll post some pics tomorrow. I'm a tired puppy.