Need help with the gauges

[ECU PIRATE]

Men,

The guy I bought my project from added some aftermarket gauges to the top of the dash bezel. the insides are pretty hacked up as the attached pic shows. how much trouble would it be to swap out all the gauges with one from another truck with oil pressure, temp, and voltmeter? Is it plug and play or am I going to need to re-wire the whole dash? I am heading to the local pick and pull on Saturday to see what they have from the Cash for Clunkers program...................

Thanks,

Mike

[flamingbig10]

if the wiring isn't hack up and its made for gauges not dummies you'll be just fine if use 1 from a 81-83 are the same I believe

[Storm Chaser]

It looks like your truck originally had dummy lights. Another similar-year panel with dummy lights should definitely work, but I'm not sure if factory gauges use the same harness.

Keep in mind also that when the senders for the aftermarket gauges were installed, the factory ones were most likely discarded. Most budget aftermarket gauges were manual gauges (oil pressure has a tube from the pressure point to the gauge- oil actually travels through this and in turn, manually applies pressure to the gauge. Temp gauge has a bulb that screws into the block with a capillary tube to the gauge, usually filled with mercury or a similar thermoconducing fluid). Factory gauges on your year of truck are most likely electrical (the senders convert the pressure/temp to an electrical signal and send it to the gauges through wires).

Sorry for the short lesson, but I wanted you to understand that just a gauge panel swap was probably not going to get you where you wanted.