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Fri Jun 13, 2008 12:05 pm

Great stuff Andy, highly detailed, thanks for taking the time to brake it down in such a uniform fashion.

Sun Aug 03, 2008 5:05 pm

Just another tip. If you don't have the gel or Pendex, I just used a plastic from an empty bottle of Mountain Dew. Sanded it, doubled it and it looks great.

Mon Aug 04, 2008 6:21 pm

yeah i used the file folder tabs too and they work great plus i have enough to do it about 30 more times if need be

Tue Feb 03, 2009 4:26 pm

So the only way to see if its broken is to open up the odometer?

Tue Feb 03, 2009 7:52 pm

My speedo makes a loud whining sound after I get up to 40mph and it is really annoying. I got up the courage to rip apart my speedo today after reading this thread. What I found is a little sad. As you can see I have the brass gear (the one that is usually plastic and busted. The problem lies in the vertical gear that the arrow points to. It is stripped on one side at the bottom. Has anyone else had this problem? Is there a replacement that I can buy?

Tue Feb 03, 2009 9:22 pm

Need speedo parts too...any body out there?

Tue Feb 03, 2009 10:13 pm

I'm thinking I might have to buy an old one and hope that it doesn't have the same problem.

Wed Feb 04, 2009 5:06 am

johnnypan wrote: Need speedo parts too...any body out there?
PM sent.

Wed Feb 04, 2009 4:06 pm

mnussbau wrote: johnnypan wrote: Need speedo parts too...any body out there?
PM sent.

Do you have any more extra speedo parts?

Thu Jun 04, 2009 5:03 pm

Thanks for a great tutorial! Here's mine:

Before:

New gels:

After:

Kyle

Thu Jun 04, 2009 5:50 pm

Good job!

Shiny housing interior! What did you do there?

Custom colored gels?

Thu Jun 04, 2009 5:59 pm

Actually, the housing was already pretty nice, just wiped it out with paper towels. The gels are the standard "binder index tabs" sanded with 1000 grit and darkened with colored Sharpies.

Kyle

Thu Jun 04, 2009 6:13 pm

Gotcha. Didn't think about darkening. My next speedo project will need some sort of darkening because I'm running LEDs and even a double layer of sanded folder tabs lets waaaay too much light in.

I just got some WW repair gels. I need to gauge the difference too.

Your housing made me wonder about light reflectivity. In my last speedo project, I shot the interior with a gloss white and then layered it with relfective glass beads that are used on roads. It came out well, but not quite as bright for the night lights as I was shooting for.

I wonder if a metallic silver (chrome in a can) would ofer a better option.

Thu Jun 04, 2009 8:04 pm

'69Custom wrote: In my last speedo project, I shot the interior with a gloss white and then layered it with relfective glass beads that are used on roads. It came out well, but not quite as bright for the night lights as I was shooting for.
I think the glass beads are what hurt you...
mine looks just fine.. I used gloss yellow with stock bulbs
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?p=3427186#3427186

Fri Jun 05, 2009 11:07 pm

I beg to differ on this one, Fattie. I think it was the nature of the LEDs. Honestly, I considered that it was the beads, but these things are highly reflective! LEDs, as opposed to stock bulbs, just don't have the same quaklity of radiating light in that glowing fashion, so the light doesn't wrap around the face of the speedometer as well as stock.

I did use two different types of white LEDs as a test: one inverted, the other a Superstar with a 120 degree dispersement and allegedly 3x brighter than average LEDs. The Superstar won... barely.

What I want to try next are Sven's whites. He has a nice set up for his other LEDs. Also, I looked more closely at how bulbs sit in the speedo. The night lights are set too closely to the back side of the face, limiting how the light can project. I want to tighten the bulb holders a little, then insert the bulbs only half way into the speedo housings. I want to know if pulling them back a bit will help any.

Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:33 pm

What are you guys using to clean the gauge face with? I used a non amonia glass cleaner.... It started to wipe off the black paint......

Fri Jun 12, 2009 8:34 pm

I once tried a watered down glas cleaner, but nearly had the same problem.

I would guess an amonia-free cleaner would work better.

Wed Mar 17, 2010 6:14 am

wompninja wrote:

My speedo makes a loud whining sound after I get up to 40mph and it is really annoying. I got up the courage to rip apart my speedo today after reading this thread. What I found is a little sad. As you can see I have the brass gear (the one that is usually plastic and busted. The problem lies in the vertical gear that the arrow points to. It is stripped on one side at the bottom. Has anyone else had this problem? Is there a replacement that I can buy? If you have plastic gears, etc., that you cannot find any place else, Mr. Caplan at http://www.odometergears.com/ can often take your broken one, and make a form of a GOOD one & then the actual gear. That's how he came up with the 11-tooth super odometer gear for me. Perhaps he can work up something for the plastic shaft and gear above. :?: Worth a try if you get desperate.

Sun Mar 28, 2010 5:05 pm

glutamodo, that was a fantastic explanation with photos. I have a 73 super & it is somewhat different. It does not have the attachment hooks. It just compresses in from the front with a rubber collar. I used a craftman bent screwdriver with a phillips on one end & a flat head on the other. This worked well for removing the bezel as I was able to pry against the housing gently all the way around using the flat end. I did not need to remove the gears as they worked fine but I lucked out and found that the gels were still inside (they are called gels but mine are thick plastic with holes that snuggly pop over small plastic keepers "tits"). One of the plastic tits had broken off leaving my blinker gel lopsided. That is what made me investigate this to start with. I wish I had taken pics now but I only have the use of my right arm due to a motorcycle accident so I was only thinking about getting it back together. I was able to glue the tit back on and reassembled everything using a hard rubber hammer to install the bezel. Wish I had found your post before I started. Anyway Thank you so much for your time to inform us.

Wed May 19, 2010 9:22 pm

Great info here. I hope I can find it again when my speedo breaks