HELP with Gauge Cluster

[Bucky66]

I know this has been discussed over and over but I have not figured it out. It will probably be something I am just over looking.

My Bronco is a 1966. It is a full on Resto-mod but I have not been able to get my factory gauges to work. My original wiring harness was shot and I have a new one from west coast Broncos that I installed.

The install instructions say to take a wire from the fuse box and directly to the voltage regulator on the back of the gauge cluster. I did this but nothing works. New voltage regulator and still nothing

Ground issue ... I thought about this so I connected a ground to the 3 gauges requiring a ground and to the voltage regulator and grounded them to a bolt for one of the door straps. I think I used 18ga wire but not certain.

Now I see looking at diagrams that originally in a 1966 the wire going from the fuse box to the gauge cluster had a splice that went to the ignition switch. My ignition switch is after market and is not stock.

Do I need something spliced to the ignition switch or is it not needed? If so what post on the back of the new ignition switch will it go to?

Is my trouble still ground? I left the cluster out of the dash to continue my trouble shooting.

Thanks for the help

 

[SHX669]

Have you checked to see if you're getting a pulsed 6-7 Volts out of the IVR ?
I assume this wire to the fuse box is a "switched " circuit vs "full time ".
If you have everything painted and nice new body mts and etc you might not be getting good ground. I ground the dash to the motor , the motor to the frame , the frame to the body - and probably a couple of variables of that .

 

[ransil]

the cluster case is ground, which connects to the dash which is ground which has or had a wire in the middle that should be ground else the dash is grounded via the screws to the body and somehow need to get back to the battery.

IMO this is a bad idea

better idea, when rewiring run a ground from the cluster to a common ground point that also goes directly to the battery, do the same with the dash ( weld on a stud) and all devices should get grounded to this point.

 

[SHX669]

A couple of years ago i helped a guy who although didn't do a frame off he disassembled everything he could and painted it all with multiple coats of paint and multiple coats of clear.
To get his grounds he ran a wire from the - side of battery in a loop around the entire Bronco then he connected all of his grounding wire into that . I suppose the guys with glass bodies would have to do the same thing.

 

[JAFO]

When I am in doubt of ground and such I will use a long 18 ga wire connected directly to the ground at the battery. Then tie stuff to that known good ground temporarily to troubleshoot. Multi-meter to verify +12 volts where it should be.
Divide and conquer.
Before I installed my gauge cluster into the dash I laid it out on a table, with a good battery also available on the table. Table beside the Bronco chassis. Connected up the wires and ran wires from the sensors (body was off the frame, engine and all was sitting there exposed. Made it easy to check out everything. I knew the gauges worked before they went into the dash.

 

[DirtDonk]

Yeah Bucky, you've got to find out where the power stops. Or if it stops.
If you have power at the input side of the regulator, then check the output. If it's a stock one, it pulses like mentioned. If it's an aftermarket electronic one, it has a steady output of something lower than battery voltage. I want to say about 5 volts or so?

If you have power on the output side, then you need to verify that your gauges are working, your sending units are working, your grounds are grounding, and all that.

You don't say how exactly they're not working either. Do you get nothing? Or do you get incorrect readings?
Are you checking this with the key in RUN, or ACC? On some harnesses that matters.

So just a few more things to check. But as the others have said and you already thought of, grounding of gauge clusters can be a real cluster.

Paul