oops. Double post.

[This message has been edited by Reallybig (edited 03-14-2015).]

Ok. Well that worked so here we go...

You start with the picture above.

Then remove the cover.


Take off the metal top piece.


The tach side pulls straight out.


You're gonna want to upgrade to bright LED's if you want to go with smoked glass. a couple of nuts and the cover comes off the tach mechanism


Make your life easy and label all the plug terminals. You'll hate yourself later if you don't.




Here is you typical Walmart automotive lighting improvement LED strip. Normally meant for import "tuner" wanna be's. Use your dremel and cut some fiberglass circuit board with metal foil on one side into an adapter for the poor stock bulbs.


Grind out the middle section to make two separate contact areas to solder your wires onto so you can plug it into the stock bulb receptical. Remember, LED's are polarity sensitive and won't work one way. Check before plugging in and buttoning up your dash.


Like so...




Now crush this thing. But wear proper PPE.


In case you were wondering which one is positive and which one is negative.


I cut the lens from the cavalier tach gauge cluster to use as a mounting place for the LEDs




Don't mount them like this. Mount the LEDs in the hockey stick shape of the tach display. You'll get better visibility. For those of you who don't know what hockey is... Google it.


I used ca glue and activator to hold things in place


Ta-Da!


Trim off the outer flap


You'll need to trim off the area inside the line to clear the steering column


Back view for some reason


I think it's trimmed here


Marked are the other areas you will have to trim. Note the line at the top as well










Use some extra material to make a coulple of spacer tabs.


Should now look something like this. Now those tabs go around the two screw holes at the bottom. I used CA glue and activator again




Here you can see why they are shaped the way they are




A couple of stock screw with washers to hold things in place


A closer look.


But of course you want to know how to modify the fiero cluster housing to make things fit. I got pics for that too if you want me to continue....

Ok. Let's continue.

You WANT two of these. These are the connectors that plug into the back of the fiero cluster. They have those great hook thingys that grab onto the cluster and don't slip out. The Cavalier comes with ones that just press in and are held in by the gauge cluster being screwed in place, whereas the fiero by design needs them to be held in place with those clips. Not the end of the world if you can't get them but you at least have one with the fiero gauge cluster. The other plug for the fiero is too small to work with the Cavalier pod. So grab the plugs with the Cavalier pod as you will need at least one and the one from your fiero. It's nice to have the pig tail wire ends in some cases where the fiero wire needs to be extended.


As for what needs to be done to the fiero pod to make the Cavalier cluster fit? Grab a Dremel and do this....






And this...






Now we are going to play with this thing. The metal piece that was screwed onto the top of the Cavalier cluster attaching it to the grey face thing.


Do this to it.


Now to fill this spot with one of the pieces and make it hold the Cavalier cluster in place.


This piece goes here... some pilot holes and leftover screws will hold it in place.



And the other side.


Make sure not to drill into the circuit boards. The white plastic is kinda funny stuff. It doesn't burn with heat the way most plastic does but melts kinda grainy. It does however crack easily if you don't drill the darn pilot holes! So don't cut corners in that area.


Notice the metal pieces from the front in the top two corners of the fiero pod. Poorly circled is a stubby sheetmetal screw I used to further anchor the Cavalier cluster into the fiero pod.


A closer look




Making some cardboard templates, I used that extra Cavalier cluster flap I cut off and fabbed up some filler pieces. I put them on white paper so they could be seen easier.


With the 1\8" holes drilled, a couple of pop rivits ineach piece holds them tight.




Now you can pull out the whole cavalier pod and it looks like this...


You can see in this picture that the sections between the display on the right have been made larger as has the area above the speedo. This is because with the difference between the angle of the cavalier gauge cluster to the driver and the angle of the fiero gauge cluster to the driver, the stock cavalier instrument cover actually prevents a portion of the display from being seen. In another Cavalier digital dash swap I did, I just cut out the bars between all the displays on the right side. Much easier!


You can kinda see what I mean in this pic. The flash really drowned out the display!


Ok. I'm into this for over a half hour and got a few things to do this evening. More tomorrow. If you want...

I did some digging and took some fresh pics with a new SD card for ya.

Here is a picture of the back of one of my spare Cavalier digital dashes. I have the plug installed into only one of the two ports... this one. All of the wires are taped up and isolated from each other and the black wire (-) and pink with black stripe wire (+) are set aside for 12 V power.


With the cluster flipped over and the two wires sticking out the right side... power is eagerly waiting


ALL I did was connect the 12 V battery (2000mAh) to the two wires, black - and pink\black + and she fired right up.
Here is its system check mode at its peak


And when it is done it drops down to this and stays here waiting for you to re-attach the car, start your cavalier and drive away.


Like that will ever happen. The poor Cavalier digital dash must feel like Robocop when he realized the rest of his body was scrapped and this is all that was kept.

I would bring a battery into the yard and test the cluster after I pulled it so I didn't buy a dud. After being burned the first time that is. I do have two spares and am willing to part with the one in the picture if you are interested. I can also make you a smoked lens as I have enough plexi left for a couple. PM me and we can go from there. If not, I'll finish answering all the questions and posting pics (when\if I get them recovered)

As a side note; all of the white print on the Cavalier grey face is backlit and shows up through the smoked lens when the lights are on. I thought that was pretty neat.

quote Originally posted by cmechmann: I know they are getting very hard to find, but has anyone tried a Cimarron dash.

The Cimarron dash. Compliments of google images.0


My personal favorite. The Riviera digital dash. I have a working one but supposedly need the matching ECM and BCM piggy backed to communicate. Just not that inspired right now.

[This message has been edited by Reallybig (edited 03-19-2015).]

Reallybig - PM Sent