'94 TBird odometer

Aug 04, 2006 9 Replies

'allo,



I log date, mileage, and gallons when I gas up so as to monitor gas-mileage. Did so yesterday and noticed that the mileage was the same as the last gas-fill.



Reset the tripmeter and put 25 mi. on the beasty. No change in odometer or tripmeter readings.



But the speedo appears to work fine.



Anybody wrestled such an alligator or just have knowledge of how speedo/odometer/tripmeter function on '94 'Boid (LX V8,



65k mi.)? The '94 is the one with the nice set of analog gauges.

Thanks, Puddin'


Pretty common Puddin. The speedo is electrical and the circuit that drives the odo\trip meter is dead. You can replace the speedometer head in the cluster itself or swap the whole instrument cluster. Finding a used speedo with around 65K is gonna be tricky, I think. See if the speedo head is still available from Ford.

That happened on my CV a few months ago. I pulled cluster and proceeded to disassemble odometer and found one of the teeth had stripp from the drive gear on the stepper motor. I suppose you could replace it by robbing one from another head but, I chose to simply stuff a used cluster in it that I found on Ebay for $25. At the age and mile, I will simply indicate the mileage on the title to be unknown when I sell or trade it. It won't make a hill of beans difference in the value of the beast.

Lugnut

It's easy enough to keep notes on the indicated mileage of the old and new odometers, and the date of the odometer change. I wouldn't try going the "Unknown" route, for no other reason than CYA.

Some states have a form that needs to be filled out and kept attached to the vehicle title slip, and given to the next buyer of the car that lists the corrected mileage on the vehicle.

Or you put a note about it in the hand-written Bill Of Sale when you sell the car - "Odometer indicates 80,000 miles but the actual mileage is 93,000 miles, odometer broke on (date), car was driven approximately 1,000 miles, and the odometer was swapped at an indicated 75,000 miles on (date) with a used unit indicating 63,000 miles."

Otherwise they could accuse you of falsifying the mileage or rolling back the odometer - either of which could be big trouble.

-->--

100k miles. Unless it is a Mercedes or something like that it just doesn't make any significant difference to the value of an older vehicle unless it is a real creampuff. Those are very rare outside the owners mind.

Lugnut

"Bruce L. Bergman" wrote

And if you plan on changing the odo now, and selling the car someday, try taking a picture of the old and new odometers together (in the same pic) before the old one is removed. Keep the old odo (or full cluster) in a box with the notes and the picture, and give it all to the buyer.

Much thanks to Lugnut for helpful info. Also to Bruce and MasterBlaster.

A couple of fast Q's for Lugnut if he's still tuned:

Did the Ebay $25 include shippg/handling?

On a scale of 0-10, how difficult to extract/replace the cluster?

Cheers, Puddin'

Looking at my bill, it looks like shipping USP from CA to GA was $14. The cluster they sent was out of a low mileage unit apparently with only 12K miles showing. It is quite obvious that my CV has surpassed that severtal times and the title to me indicated mileage could not be verified. I buy used cars more on age and condition than mileage because I am only interested in the transportation value to me unless it is a special interest type vehicle. It is not a complicated job to change with basic tools. You just need a little care. It is easier to get the plastic trim locks to release if you can do it on a warm day.

Lugnut

So the whole ball o' wax was about $39 ...

Forewarned is forearmed. Glad it doesn't require special tools.

I'll try to catch it merely warm in a few weeks, when the temp in my lil' garage is under 160 F. :-)

Again, much thanks.

Puddin'

I sometimes pretty much discount shipping charges. From where I live, it cost $10 to make a round trip to where they sell gas. I have to consider that for anything I want and if shipping charges are less, then it is less than getting it myself sometimes.

Lugnut

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