It is 81 - 86 trucks the tach will "bolt in" as I have an 81. Beside the tach you also need the printed board on the back of the cluster for the tach.
If you have gauges and find a truck with a tach & gauges just grab the full cluster.

At 1 point I was going to do this. Then at 1 point was going to do this if the 1G ALT I have now stopped working.
Got to tell you I think if what I have now stops I will get a 1G replacement and be done.
I don't have anything other than factory AC / Heat, factory radio, and wipers & lights. Oh I do have driving lights but that is it.
I do a lot of driving in the dark, out the door between 2am to 4am, it is only 2 miles to the high way and I am on it for about 30 miles.
So more than enough time at high RPM to put back into the battery even with the heat on.

Only time I can see the need for a 3G ALT is if you are running a lot of power hungry devices at low RPM
OR
If maybe running the 2G fire starter ALT and if you have to change it might as well go with the 3G ALT.
The only thing that confuses me is the AMP gauge bypass if going 3G and think the only thing that turns me off to it.
Dave ----

 

I've seen the full cluster go for about 130 but honestly that's too rich for my blood just for the tac

 

Is that on Ebay?
I would think if you can find one in a junk yard for a little, ok a lot less.
I was lucky as a member found one cheap in a JY for me with the printed board.
Only thing that would have been better is if it was a 4000 RPM max and not the 6000 RPM I have as I have a 300 low RPM six.
Dave ----

 

I'd have to make my job the junkyard. One in my town seldomly has anything for more than a couple days at best

 

The cluster will be a straight bolt in then. On the 3G, its just a more robust alternator that puts out more amps at idle than the stock 1G and 2G alternators found on our trucks. If you have a bone stock truck then you probably wont have to upgrade unless you wanted to. I am only looking at upgrading cause I got some aftermarket circuits not to mention I am moving away from carbureted and would prefer to have some cushion on my electrical system.

Yep, only reason I am doing it is my current 1G last I drove the truck at idle my blower motor on my AC would slow down and headlights would dim. Little throttle speed up on the blower motor and the lights brighten. Probably would have gotten around that with just a new 1G alternator or replacing the original motorcraft regulator. But with my auxiliary circuits I have which consist of dual Apollo 6" 100w halogen driving lights, the silverstar ultra H4 headlight bulbs in composite housings, a cb with a cb amp, with the potential of adding four more lights on a roll bar if I install a roll bar. I would need a better alternator. But now I have decided to go with a Sniper Stealth on my 306 build as I can convert my entire truck over to a pump in the tank fuel injection setup for under $2,000. So I think I should do a 3G upgrade running what I currently have along with a ECM, and fuel pump. Then if Dakota digital ever releases their new retro RTX lineup for our 80 - 86 trucks then I would be swapping that in my truck which makes all gauges electric including the speedometer. Would have to see if the speed sensor could screw into the cruise control pulse generator as I don't want to lose my OE cruise.

I got my cluster for under $100. In fact I believe mine was $75 for my cluster from ebay.

This is my cluster after I repainted the needles with new flourscent red needle paint. When I got the cluster all needles were white almost.

 

Replaced the ratty old mud flaps on my truck today. They were there ever since I bought this truck in 1992. Looked like they were cut from an old conveyor belt.

Pic shows an old one laying on the ground behind the new one.

 

I bought myself a little birthday gift and mounted it on the truck this morning.

I am waiting on my big birthday gift but with this virus thing I don't know when it will get here
Dave ----

 

Well, my round tuit finally showed up today. Been waiting years for it! Now that I’ve got one, I decided to replace the shocks on my pickup.

Something tells me this was LONG overdue. Note how the old ones didn’t even extend to the same length when unloaded. Can’t remember ever changing these before, wonder if these were original...

 

ALRIGHT KARL.........you & I r n the same boat..........or truck I guess, I 2 am happy 2 b working on my truck again.........I gave mine a good de-greasing looking 4 oil leak!!!!!

 

Was browsing Pico`s online catalog and found these military style battery terminals. I am torn between using these for my truck and getting the regular lead style battery terminals and just solder for a OE look. This would allow me to add circuits where need be at the battery even though I wont be adding any more circuits outside of two power wires. I just dont know how durable using a 4ga or 2ga terminal and soldiering in a 4ga battery cable and two extra wire pigtails for my auxiliary fuse box and my sniper stealth.



I like the rugged heavy duty look of these, especially over the marine style vertical lug terminals. Just feel this would provide a better connection as I can have a terminal for individual wires vs all into one.

 

Changed to 56 jet size on primary yesterday. 55 was slightly too lean. The 56's run like it did with the stock 57's but the AFR's are where I want them to be cruising, right around 14.5-15. I laid the thing to the floor and was doing 65MPH 3/4 of the way up this short and steep freeway on ramp. Yeah, I had a grin on my face for a while after that!

 

Looks like I wont be doing what you are doing. With my decision to go with EFI, I now only have to go into the fuel map and punch in what AFR I want for what situation.

Is what it says in the techlibrary for the EFI I am looking at. I think for idle I will leave default 14.7:1 but for cruise I am thinking of trying 15:1 to 16:1 for economy and wot I will try 12.5:1 but see what my 306 will like best between 11.5:1 and 13.3:1.

Just sucks for me cause this decision change this late in the game means I now have to get the components I need to do the swap. But I think I will like it better than the carb.

 

Tried to improve, revive old 71........Look for oil leak & check on Steering box!!!
Also a little cleaning, and posted photos in forum 4 my truck !

 

Going to bring this back up to the top, not sure how it got that far back from the front page.

Only thing I did today was hurt my paypal credit by purchasing a Gold Holley Sniper Stealth fuel injection system for my 306 build. Didn't get the complete kit I got the base kit as its under $1,300. My plan is to swap in a '85-'86 fuel tank in my '82 and throw in a 67 gph walbro foxbody style fuel pump. Just need to source a NOS '85-'86 sending unit so I can get the proper non linear ohm rating for my OE gauge. I thought about going the cheaper route since I found out the 85-86 tanks don't have any kind of baffling in them, figured be cheaper to just run a frame mounted pump but I would still need a return of some kind to my tank plus I don't like the thought of a loud pump on the frame rather have it muffled in the fuel tank where it can be cooled by the fuel.

Wished I would have decided on this sooner so I didn't spend $300 on that Summit 600cfm 4V carb I bought. but at the time I couldn't find any fuel inject setup with a ford style kick down attachment for a C4/C6 style transmission. Then I stumbled across the Stealth which has it and now I feel foolish for not finding it sooner.

Hopefully this doesn't hurt the performance of my engine, I know on a carb you don't want to go too large of a cfm as it hurts air velocity and throttle response but ive yet to see throttle response be hurt by a holley sniper fuel injection system. Just cant wait to see how nice my truck will be getting better fuel economy as well as more power and the ability to idle in neutral and in gear at the same exact rpm.

 

I hadn’t done much to the truck very interesting in a little while but I’ve spent some time getting my new rear end ready to go in. Getting ready to pull out the original one and installing a factory 4.10 posi track from a 93 Lightning.



First day I got it




After a good refreshing