1996 Cobra Odometer Problems - Help!

Hello,

My odometer and trip odometer on my Cobra are dying. They only record the miles intermittently. Since the speedo and tach are still working, I would guess the instrument cluster itself is the problem, and not the speedo cable or gear. Is this a correct diagnosis? And how hard is it to take the dash apart? I don't have a shop manual. I see a couple of screws, which is a good sign.

Can I buy a new instrument cluster aftermarket, or will I be stuck paying $$$$ for one from Ford? Can a new one be set to reflect my current mileage?

TIA for any help, Christine

Reply to
Christine Courty
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at 07 Sep 2003, Christine Courty [ snipped-for-privacy@infionline.net] wrote in news:9xS6b.8892$ snipped-for-privacy@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net:

Welcome to the club. The one on my 95 Coupe died a month ago. It's not to hard to remove it, check the site in my signature, go to the specs page and scroll down to the paragraph on bezel install. It will tell you how to remove the cluster.

The only aftermarket one I know of is made by Autometer and I believe about $450. You can buy a used OEM one, I did, but the mileage won't tally unless you get real lucky (ping Musttanguy for one). It can be adjusted but as that's 'odometer fraude' it's not documented anywhere so I don't know how to. You can get a new one from Ford. They want you VIN and they'll check you current mileage. Your new unit will reflect that. For mine it was about $300 just for the unit alone. Not worth it in my opinion and the used one I got was only off by about 7K miles. Not much on a 108K (now 101K) car with a 47K engine. :-)

With the 99+ LED odo's you can just swap a chip. With our older electric ones this is not possible...

Hope this helps.

Reply to
Paul

Looks like this is not an unusual problem these days eh? Mine is still dead and haven't had the opportunity to find a good one yet...

Reply to
RioRedGT

I remember takiing mine back to the dealership.

"My odometer intermittently stops. The speedometer still functions. The odometer motor is bad"

*drops car off, shop takes it for a ride*

"We didn't find any problems."

"Look, I'll just take the car, never put another mile on it, and then trade it back in here when I'm done putting 100,000 hard miles on it. It won't be

*my* problem."

"Bring it in next week... we'll change the dash"

JS

Reply to
JS

I would think one could just manually spin the speedo or turn part of the inner workings forward such that the milage can be made to match. Also, it's probably some component in the assembly that dies. Provided there aren't any seals to break I would guess one could just replace the broken part without touching the milage display.

Reply to
Brent P

at 08 Sep 2003, Brent P [ snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com] wrote in news:4317b.288193$cF.88699@rwcrnsc53:

It's not the speedo, but the odo. Which appears to be driven by a small electric motor. Which is what most likely went bed. I've looked at my old gauge cluster but haven't found a way to remove that motor without causing damage.

Reply to
Paul

Jack the car up and remove the speedometer cable from the transmission. Attach a rotary tool (preferrably electric, battery ones will die mighty fast) so that it spins the end of the cable. Turn the key to "ON' and you will now be putting miles on your car.

I know of no real way to take the miles off. Also note that this will take quite some time to do.

Changing the odometer isn't documented and is tamper-proof, as Paul and perhaps someone else said, because it is considered fraud. This is the only way I know to run the miles up on a functioning odometer.

JS

Reply to
JS

Unfortunately on a 96-up Gt / Cobra, the cluster is fed electronically, not manually, so this isn't going to work. Your problem definitely lies in the cluster itself as both the odos and speedo are fed from the same source. You might get lucky and find a used one on Ebay or Corral. Be sure it's from a 96 or 97 and not

98... the pin-outs changed that year and thus aren't compatible with your 96 wiring harness. It would probably be a good idea to have the new cluster set and calibrated by a shop that reports its work to its respective state so you'll maintain accurately documented mileage and not get zapped by a fraudulent CarFax (or worse) when you sell the car.

Good Luck!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Tom

1998 GT Coupe 5-spd. Bright Atlantic Blue K&N FIPK, Tri-Ax, 3.73's, FRPP Coated Shorties, SpeedCal, P&P 2K Heads, 2K Intake, Bassani X-Pipe and Cat-Back, Subframe Connectors, JMS Chip, Eagle Alloy Wheels
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Reply to
bluestang98

It should if you take the whole driven gear out of the transmission and turn the key to the ON position... that lights up all of the wiring and sensors, and the spinning would be just that of the transmission....

JS

Reply to
JS

at 09 Sep 2003, JS [ snipped-for-privacy@home.now] wrote in news:Rni7b.8604$ snipped-for-privacy@nwrdny02.gnilink.net:

No it won't. As I stated before, the odo and trip are turned by a small electromotor. That is fed by the VSS sensor data. It appears that this lil motor (at least on mine) has failed. So however long you play with the cable and a drill is not going to do any good unfortunately.

Hope this helps...

Reply to
Paul

LOL!

excellent

Reply to
Christopher Shea

Paul...

I was talking about setting the new odometer if the mileage is less. I had the same problem that you did with my '97 Cobra... the motor stopped working in mine as well. It was still intermittent when mine died and I could smack the dashboard and it would start working again, but for a car with 26k on the clock, I didn't think that was a real swift design.

JS

Reply to
JS

at 09 Sep 2003, JS [ snipped-for-privacy@home.now] wrote in news:m_r7b.8888$ snipped-for-privacy@nwrdny02.gnilink.net:

Ah. Sorry, I misunderstood. Yeah, that would work although it would be considered odometer fraud. :-) I sure hope you got it fixed under warranty. To me it looks like a quality problem with that electromotor. If in here in not even a month, 3 people report the same problem it has me wondering how many more occurances of it there are that we do not know about...

Reply to
Paul

I have an extended warranty (just bought the car last year) and it still cost me the $100 each-time deductible, but at least it works now.

I'm sure there are a ton of problems with these things... seems like the older they get, the more likely they are to go, not even mileage, just time. Just like the swaybars on the V8 cars it seems...

JS

Reply to
JS

If you can get it fixed properly for $100.00, the go for it. I think most speedo shops would charge $100.00 just for recalibrating and documenting the new cluster.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Tom

1998 GT Coupe 5-spd. Bright Atlantic Blue K&N FIPK, Tri-Ax, 3.73's, FRPP Coated Shorties, SpeedCal, P&P 2K Heads, 2K Intake, Bassani X-Pipe and Cat-Back, Subframe Connectors, JMS Chip, Eagle Alloy Wheels
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Reply to
bluestang98

Ah, I see what you're getting at now. I interpreted your earlier statement to mean that there was a mechanical spinning cable that actuates the 96-up cluster like on older models. Yeah, I guess if you spin the VSS it probably would work.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Tom

1998 GT Coupe 5-spd. Bright Atlantic Blue K&N FIPK, Tri-Ax, 3.73's, FRPP Coated Shorties, SpeedCal, P&P 2K Heads, 2K Intake, Bassani X-Pipe and Cat-Back, Subframe Connectors, JMS Chip, Eagle Alloy Wheels
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Reply to
bluestang98

I had it done over 10K miles ago without a whimper of a problem. It's just sad that I'm putting that many miles on such a nice Cobra. It's starting to show its chassis age after all of the miserable, pothole laden roads around here. It squeaks and moans over bumps, the suspension squeaks and wants lubed. I still need to put its saving grace, the GW subframe connectors that are sitting in my room, on the car, but finding someone I trust to take a welder to my baby is rough...

JS

Reply to
JS

That's the only way I know how to do it. To try to tamper with the odometer that way would be insane... it takes way too long to put miles on that way (even spinning it at what the computer figures is 100MPH, it still takes 100 hours to go 10K miles) to try to wind it all the way back to 0 and start over, and the little motor from the replacement cluster would probably die again after 1 million miles. It would only work if you needed to put a few miles on it.

If there was a demand for it, I could make something that would plug into the cluster and simulate a VSS... so it could just sit on the table instead of being in the car. I don't see any demands for something like that though as there are proper tools to set the odometer.

JS

Reply to
JS

Thanks to everyone for their advice. The odometer/trip odometer seems to work intermittently, so it hasn't failed completely. Looks like a design flaw. Of course the car is long off of warranty, with no extended warranty. Guess I'll just keep an eye out for a used instrument cluster. Sigh. Car only has (approximately!) 25,000 miles on it when this happens. It's kinda nice not to be running up the miles, but I like to know the actual miles myself, as well as the resale issue.

Reply to
Christine Courty

at 09 Sep 2003, Christine Courty [ snipped-for-privacy@infionline.net] wrote in news:ytw7b.2656$ snipped-for-privacy@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net:

Ping Tim (musttanguy) who is a regular here and has many connections. He may be able to get you a used one with mileage close to yours. Also with a not 100% functioning odo, how can you tell when to eg change the oil or rotate the tires? Which was my issue and the reason I replaced it.

Reply to
Paul

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