Fj40 dashboard

[mellows40]

G`day guys,

First thanks for all the help and advice I have recieved lately. My 40 is coming along great and quickly getting to where I want it...
Well my next little problem is the dashboard instruments... speedo, odometer. The lighting at night is pitiful... Does anyone know where I can get it upgraded so it can easily be seen at night at a glance.
Bringing it up into the 20th century, cause at the moment the speedo is hard to read, when it shouldn`t be that difficult..

I`ll put up a photo and upgrade details soon...

[aussie_stu]

20th century...................

[croozy]

I put VDO stuff in my shorty too & all but the speedo are easy to read. I haven't worried about it so much but you probably just need to change to globe in the back of the speedo to a brighter one if you can get one.


I looked at that speedo when I was building mine but thought 300km/h was a bit ambitious. lol

[RAY185]

The dim instrument lights on 40's is a common complaint and it all comes down to the design. There are "guards" that go over the bulbs in the instrument panel that block out too much light. All you need to do is pull the instrument panel out, dismantle it and cut off the "guards" and refit. Standard wattage bulbs will be more than enough once this is done. There was some instructions on the net somewhere, maybe do a search on here or google.

[Raptor_67]

My brother just picked up a Shorty 40. Same issue. Its been fitted with blue lights in the speedo, but its just about impossible to see at night.
Will try dismantleing and piss off the guards. Hopefully wont melt anything.
Will let you know how that goes.

[RAY185]

If they are those poxy blue silicone rubbers over the standard bulbs, piss them off. They look g.ay and block out alot of light in the process. You can get led lights to fit in there if you're really keen....

[aussie_stu]

I put VDO stuff in my shorty too & all but the speedo are easy to read. I haven't worried about it so much but you probably just need to change to globe in the back of the speedo to a brighter one if you can get one.


I looked at that speedo when I was building mine but thought 300km/h was a bit ambitious. lol

been thinking about setting it up to read twice the actual speed got it cheap of e-bay so it's all good, keep my eye out for the 120km/h one down the track maybe

[Tooheys]

I trimmed the guards like ray said and put a couple of super bright led's in place of the bulbs. I also brought some small led tube lights that I put in behind the instruments aswell.

I brought all the stuff from Jaycar and had a mate wire it up with the right resistors and stuff so they ran properly. He has the same setup in his HJ47 and it works well.

[De-lux]

Hey Stu,

How hard is it to replace all your gauges with some newer, prettier looking ones?

[hj 45]

Holy grave dig! As mentioned, one can replace the standard bulbs with leds, or, there's another option, a bloke on mud does this:

http://forum.ih8mud.com/40-55-series-te ... uster.html

Very nice.

[De-lux]

Sorry to secondary grave dig, but I have some q's:

I have access to some VDO gauges, what is the best way of using these... ?

Do you use the standard wiring that runs from the engine bay to the instrument cluster, but seperate it off to the newer gauges? Or run new wiring from the engine / sensor?

Also, are my gauges mechanical or electrical? I have a 1978 BJ40.

[hj 45]

The standard guages are electrical.

[De-lux]

Sweet as... So if I get some VDO electrical gauges, it should be relatively simple to work out which wires are for each (which are for oil pressure, water temp etc) then it should work straightforwardly?