Bouncing Speedo Needle

[Maxim]

Hello everyone,
I have a 1981 Malibu with the sweeping style speedometer and for some reason, it does not want to stay still. It will vibrate a lot, then as soon as it gets to around 35 mph, it because more steady. The gas gauge is also bouncing back and forth. Any way to fix this or I need a replacement instrument panel? Also, will the digital one from Dakota fit, even since I started off with the sweeping style speedo. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Doober]

The speedometer works using a ring inside a spinning magnet, the faster it spins the higher the speedo reads. There is a wound spring that counteracts this. A lot of older speedometers are prone to this. You could try lubricating the speedometer cable or replacing it. How much does the fuel gauge fluctuate... is it while the car is sitting still? While accel/decelerating? There may be a poor connection there, but I know mine tends to fluctuate sometimes, just from the fuel moving around in the tank. Other possibilities could be the connection to the dash harness (could try cleaning the contacts), or replacing the printed circuit board, the plastic tends to separate on the older cars and the copper corrodes. If you wanted to get a DD cluster you would need a housing from a gauge-style cluster.

The cluster must either have gauges; if it doesn't have gauges it must not<i></i> have warning lights where the gauges would be, otherwise the cluster won't work.

This is an example of the back of a cluster that won't work. The housing needs to have connections for gauges in all 4 locations (circled below). You will also need to re-pin the harness at the cluster.
http://www.maliburacing.com/gauge_conversion.html

 

[Maxim]

Wow, thanks for the quick reply. The gas gauge goes down a lot whenever I accelerate. I know it burns gas, but not that much lol. When I get back into idle, it come back up. I mean, it moves down quite a bit, like a quarter tank, then back up. I see a lot of replacement instrument clusters. I mean, I really don't mind the sweeping style speedometer, any way I can buy a new/reproduction one like that. I've searched everywhere and can't seem to find anything. Thanks. My car is currently in the shop being painted and I'm getting the interior reupholstered at the same time so I'm gonna try to order all the parts so that when its done, I can fix the last little things.

 

[Doober]

Yeah, my gas gauge does the same thing. One of the guys on here (blownbigblock) makes 'bolt in' sheetmetal panels you can mount aftermarket gauges in... personally I like it more and it's much cheaper than a set of Dakota gauges.

 

[Maxim]

Cool, I'll look into that, that's probably the best option. Thanks for your help. -Maxim