i am trying to remove the gauge cluster to try something different with the gauge color. i tried to follow NEGATIZE's info. on taking the cluster apart but i ran into trouble. he does'nt have the stock alarm...... i do. when i pull the first plastic trim peice off there are wires that are connected to the dash alarm light. i tugged on it slightly to see if maybe there was a harness but it did'nt come loose. i can't really see the bottom of it that well cuz the wire is kind tight and does'nt have much slack at all. should there be a harness down there to disconnect this light? what can i do here? i can't get the gauge fully off until i get this dang wire is disconnected.

 

You will find the alarm controller under the dash by the clutch. There is an alarm harness that plugs into the controller and all leads are labeled on the controller itself. On my Pro, I found that whoever did the installatiion tie wrapped the excess wire under the dash. Once I removed the tie wrap, I had plenty of wire to remove the trim. At any rate, it is rather easy to follow the path of the alarm LED and see where it leads for you. I hope I articulated this clearly.

 

Cut the wires and splice them back together when you re-install the trim.

I know, I know "cut them?!?!" - but seriously - they are two tiny little wires, and if you ever replaced the LED for any reason (to get a bigger one, a different color, etc) you'd probably wind up cutting them anyway.

No big deal, and soooooo much easier than tryingto disconnect them at the source, IMHO.

And - what are you gonna do with the gauge color? Are you planning to try to strip the film off the backs of the gauge faces? If you don't different colored bulbs will do squat to change the color. What "info" did NEGATIZE give you for changing the color - besides indiglos?

~HH

 

well..... does the P5 actually come with RED interior lights or are they amber? some guy here took some color condoms off the lights and it gave him more of an orange color. i want to try to get closer to the orange/amber color that my ALPINE deck has. so that's why the cluster has to come off.

 

i just did that this weekend. i have the stock alarm, with that funky led in the cluster. well, first, i suggest taking the steering column cover off. to do this, just lower it all the way and grab the top piece and pull it up. it will just pop off. then you will see that the alarm led has some wires coming down that are zip-tied to some other wires right there. i just cut the zip tie, followed the wires down under the dash, and found that there was enough slack in the wires to get the cluster cover out and let it hang down. the the rest is pretty straight forward. remove some screws here, more screws there, pull this out, etc.

the light on the back of the cluster have little orange 'condoms' over them that dilute the light a little bit. those will just pull right off. reinstall and your gauges will be orange instead of the redish that they were.

 

thanks nik. i'll try this.

 

let me know what happens!

 

well....... got it done. it was fairly simple. a couple of those "condoms" were really stuck on there though. i saw no tie wrap in mine, but the wire was wrapped around another harness below. i just disconnected the harness, unwrapped it and pulled the black gauge cover out.
i got what i was after..... ALMOST. the color is a much brighter orange now and is a much closer match to my ALPINE CDA-7894. not a PERFECT match but very close. the deck's lights seem to be an even brighter orange so i don't know if i'll be able to duplicate it exactly but i may try some other "tests" some day(i'm sort of picky about details sometimes). i'm trying to get some pics taken too so i can post them up soon.

thanks for the help!

 

good work!