I started working on this tonight.

Dash disassembled:


Instrument clusters (I'm taking the TRD speedo out of the one I just got and putting it into mine, for peace of mind):


Back of my cluster:


Front of cluster after taking all the gauges out:


All the gauges separate:


300km/h TRD speedo and stock 180km/h speedo, both mechanical:




Top of both speedos (there's a brass thing on top of the stock one, but not on the TRD one, which looks like a trigger for an over-speed buzzer on the stock one):


Back of speedo, notice the purple mentioned previously (I need to clarify with Bionikal which region he was referring to specifically):


Once the white LEDs arrive I'll install those in the cluster, and I still need to wire up and attach the Omori boost gauge to the cluster.

Bionikal...to sand back the purple as you mentioned, do I need to carefully pull the needles off the gauges so I can remove the transparencies? Do I need to sand it from the back (the side shown in the last pic), and only in areas where light is supposed to shine through I guess?

Also a general question for anyone who might know, can I take the odometer out of my stock speedo and put it into the new one, or is it too fiddly?

I've now run the hose and damper for the pressure sensor for the Omori gauge (including the annoying task of running stuff from the engine bay through the right door sill and up to the dash), and I've spent a few hours confirming and labeling the various electrical traces on the back of the cluster. My MR2 wiring diagram agreed with all the wire colours/functions for the plugs to the back of the cluster, but the locations of each wire in the plugs were different to the diagram, so that really confused things. Maybe my diagram is for US/RHD cars or something, but it's sorted now anyway.

Heres a comparison aswell rob.
This shows what it was (temp) and what it now is (everything else)

its in the experimental phase :p

im playing with some new ideas.

Tonight I was very busy finishing off my instrument cluster.

This shows 2 of the 4 white LEDs in place of the stock bulbs:


This is the gauge faces after sanding the purple off the back (ignore the black pen marks, I drew them on there so I could identify things more easily):


This is after dealing with the hotspots (where the brightness is more concentrated), I originally used reflex paper but it was too thick so I started again with the thinner paper shown here:


This is my copy of cogs' PWM dimmer circuit for the Omori boost gauge illumination:


Wiring of Omori boost gauge to cluster (the 4 adjacent holes at the top are where the stock boost gauge signal conditioning circuit normally attaches, but this was removed, so I put my dimmer circuit in the same spot and fed the wires through one of the 4 holes):


End result!...











When mounting the Omori boost gauge to the cluster, I took the easy way out...I used hot glue, because the Omori gauge fits really nicely into the space anyway so I just needed to stop it moving (I forgot to get a photo). It also meant that I could apply the glue then quickly fit the front of the cluster so the glue would set with the gauge in the perfect location.

I'm very happy with how it all turned out. Thanks to cogs and Bionikal for their help!

quote:

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Originally posted by surok

dammit now we have the same cluster

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But I think yours still has the stock back-lighting colour

OK so not stock bulbs, but still stock colour.

quote:

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Originally posted by matt234

That cluster looks great. Thanks for the write up ill be doing this when i get mine eventually :) well minus the boost guage anyway.

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Cheers Matt, let me know if you have any questions when the time comes.
FYI, some people get their cluster LEDs from Garage1217, but I got mine from SuperBrightLEDs. The LEDs I used are 'Cool White' WLED-x5 LED miniature wedge base bulbs. This is where I ordered them from (top of the page):
http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/store/index.cgi?action=DispPage&Page2Disp=%2Fmini-wedge.html