Be sure to note what gear ratio your truck has (or decode the door sticker)

Otherwise your speedometer could be way off and the truck will not drive right.

Ring and pinion gear ratios between 2.73 and 3.33:1. Most trucks do better when the ratios are 3.55:1 and greater. The ration is calculated by dividing the number of teeth on the ring gear by the number on the pinion gear. The larger the number, the "lower" the gears. Lower gears multiply torque more. Higher gears give more top speed.

Keep in mind what engine you have. I agree with RL250, but feel the need to say that the 300/4.9L engine [if stock] does not like high revs. With a 3.55 rear gear set and standard tires, 4 speed manual O.D. @ 70 mph is ~ 2200-2300 RPMs. The engine will start to feel "tight" maintaining that speed. It will not hurt the engine, but fuel mileage will suffer.


If you have a V8 engine, it will be happy at that engine speed.

Did a number of things on Rusty's instruments today, including installed a tach and speedo with trip odo, painted the needles, cleaned the connections, and built an ICVR. And, I painted the back side of the instrument bezel to get better and more light to the gauges. Here's sort of a before/after pic:

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...b66f7183ab.jpg

And here's the gauges after painting the needles:

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...9b6e3e5b5c.jpg

Your ammeter rests farther to the right than mine does. Looks really good. Still never heard a video of that thing running though!

Are you going to do the LED conversion?

I know I am real happy with mine.

Only thing is I have been contemplating if I can find someone that could make those black indicators at the top. Ive been thinking about having a custom one made to replace the 4x4 indicator and wire in a bulb for some feature. Maybe a indicator for when the roll bar lights are on. Or maybe one that says Security that slowly flashes. But I know its a un used slot and I doubt I ever will convert mine to 4x4.

Try the colored tabs for files and binder separators. I'm thinking that's the best option. Either you can place letter decals on it or place the decals, spray it black, then peel the decals off. Old welder trick for paint I came up with.

I thought of getting some colored translucent plastic and masking the text off and hitting it with black paint.

I need to see if I can get in touch with a old friend of mine from Dallas, she worked at a engraving shop. Might know of a place to check with to have one professionally made if I deside to go the route of adding a custom indicator.

Right now I need to focus on getting the water leak repaired this weekend if possible, then I need to finally break down and focus on locating the source of my miss at idle. Did some reading and the first thing to check for a miss at idle is to test the ignition switch. Not hard to start but if that is the cause maybe its just not bad enough yet to have an effect on starting.

Very nice job, as always, Gary! :-X22 You will like having the trip odometer.

Thanks, guys. I'm not currently planning to go to LED's on Rusty, but will on Dad's. However, if I'm not happy with the illumination I get on this round I will go to LED's as I really do want to be able to see.

Yes, the ammeter sits to the right a bit, but it is the only one I have now that is in good shape. I gave 3 good ones to Rocketman to use as stock for conversion to volt meters, and then discovered yesterday that the one in Rusty has a broken insulator supporting the studs. I may fix it with epoxy just to have a spare.

I personally would recommend just going the LED route as it is. The ones I picked up (which are listed in the cluster restoration/led conversion topic I started) work great and you can actually see your cluster.

When I drive at night time now, I feel like I am in a new truck from how bright all my instrumentation is. Ive seriously been thinking about doing this LED conversion on all my vehicles now. Just cant deside on what color to go with for my '56 as they didnt use color filters just a small bulb.



Now as far as my truck goes, I just got my Stewart thermostat in today from summit with a 10 pack of thermostat gaskets made by stant (only ones Summit had and it was $3 or so. One thing I noticed is this thermostat doesnt look like a conventional car thermostat but looks more like the thermostat that was in the old Mercruiser 460 boat motor we had.

Is Rusty running the 3G alternator setup? Because that alone should brighten the dash lights up. May not even need LED's then.

Today I finished up my intake and holley carb install,couple spins of the distributor and she fired right up and purred till she was at operating temp,retorqued and checked for leaks.Now I just have to check the brakes so I can take her for a spin :D

For what it's worth. I didn't notice a change in the brightness in the dash lights from the 2G to the 3G. Although mine don't dim at idle anymore, but they never really did much with the 2G anyways.

My truck was running a reman 1G 60 amp. The lights were incredibly dim. You could barely see the HVAC control panel, even with the dimmer turned to the brightest setting.