VettAid Dash Replacement Experience Anyone?
 

Well,

again my frustration level is getting at a high level only this time with a different matter. I purhased from Corvette America the VettAid 6 gauge Phantom white face gauges for my 85. My neighbor installed the dash (I trust him as he has 2004 Commemerative Edition Z06) and is as picky as I am, but he is much better with his hands. The directions looked straight forward so we thought it was ok to tackle it. Well, after installation, the speedometer is erratic at speeds below 50mph and the the car will not start (something is draining the battery). I replaced the 8 year old Interstate battery I had originally after installation thinking the battery just went dead. Put in a new battery today, started it up. Everything seemed ok. Then went back tonight, car would not start.....new battery is dead.........WTF????:willy::ack:

My neighbor is thinking maybe a set of wires this dash does not utilize that the digital did use (that he tied off) are maybe hitting metal surface and dragging down the battery, so now we are going to pull the dash back out???? also, the alternator seemed awful warm after I tried to start it just a couple of times.....this just sucks.....it's not the starter, because we put a battery charger on it and it cranks right up:crazy:

I bought the wiring harness from VettAid and also had him build a custom panel for my car (I've got 5" tach/speedo and 2 5/8" gauges that I already had).

I still don't have my speedo working, so I can't comment on the reading being erratic, but I can tell you that the wiring harness that I got from him didn't have the ground wire for the lights in the correct terminal from the stock harness. It was hooked into the low signal side of the speed sensor. Once I corrected that, I had dash lights. (I haven't had time to trace the speedo problem, but the original speedo wasn't working before either, and I've tested the sensor and it is working, so I have a wiring problem)

My guess is that there are differences in the wiring between the years and since mine is an 89, maybe he just had not encountered that so far.

As for draining the battery, that may be something that you guys did upon installation. There shouldn't be anything with an open circuit left in the unused terminals of the stock harness.

Do you have an FSM to trace all of the terminals in the dash plug?

No I don't.......I'm not sure what happened with installation.....I was at work when he did it.....Jody at VettAid has been harder to contact than God himself:toetap: nobody ever answers the phone.....I find the customer service aspect of this poor at best....oh well

I guess I will take it to my mechanic; was trying to avoid that since he just got finished with a clutch problem we encountered and he is getting tired of this car himself......my neighbor is good with his hands and I trust him, but I guess that may have been a bad idea.......I hope its something easy.........it drains the battery within minutes....I have a new battery in there as I put it in Saturday, but it went dead too.....kept the negative terminal disconnected now.....

Sounds like you have some type of indirect short circuit or it would have blown a fuse. Conductor wires on those instrument cluster harnesses are easy to mix up especially if you cut the connector off. Consult your FSM for specific connector pin descriptions or trace with a meter to determine which wires are what. The picture below has the pins for the main connector numbered which may or may not help with your struggle. Harness connections for the cluster are all the same for 84-89.

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...7/100_3747.jpg

My guess for you speedo "bounce":
You can't group VSS wires (dedicated circuit with AC voltage) in with other wires....multiple grounds or other conductors.

:thumbs:

OK, thanks for the input! He (my neighbor) is taking the new cluster out today and putting in the old cluster and see what happens....he is thinking that the alternator is bad (original one from 85) but I am not thinking that is the issue.....It has good spark while you drive it (after you use the battery charger to get it started)......I would think that the spark would be interrupted as well with a bad alternator........the battery is getting a charge while the alternator is running (from what I can tell from the volt gauge)......the cluster comes with its own wiring kit that is suposed to "plug into" the existing wires........I think the blown fuse issue is the problem......