Idea for Bay Window Bus Product - Would like some feedback

[andrig's]

All the Bay Window Bus owners out there. I started a new business last year, developing products for Air Cooled VW's. I have some dashboard related products for Bugs, Ghia's, and Split Window Buses already, but someone asked me about adapters for gauges for the Bay Window Buses.

That got me thinking, and I purchased some used parts, and did the research into what the differences were for all the '68 to '79 Bay Window Buses.

In any case, I have some 3D printed prototypes in the works to allow for custom gauges for the Bay Window Bus. I also have the matching glove box door, since the style will likely not include the pebbled finish of the stock panels. I have attached a picture of the 3D prints that hold the gauges, along with a matching glove box door. There will probably be some adjustments to these, as I am waiting on the gauges to ship, and test fit them in the panel.

Let me describe what I have done.

The gauge panel is basically the same as stock, but with the three gauge openings resized (larger), and reshaped to allow for one 4" center gauge, that would be a GPS Speedometer with 8k tach. The two side gauges will fit a 3 3/8" gauge each, and they would be dual function gauges. One with volts and fuel level and one with oil pressure and oil temperature. The center speedometer tachometer combination would have the turn signal indicators, and the bright light indicator in it. The two side gauges would have programmable warning lights for each of the gauges, so you don't lose the warning lights. The fuel gauge has a lot of presets for different Ohm readings from the sender, but I'm not sure what the Bay Window Bus Ohm range is on the fuel sender. In any case, the fuel gauge also has a custom programmable feature, and you can just operate the fuel sender by hand (of course has to be out of the tank) and you can program the fuel level accordingly.

There will also be an option for water temp in place of the oil temp, if you have done something like a Subaru engine swap, or any other engine swap (sacrilegious for some I know).

I have done custom artwork for the gauges to make them look like OEM gauges, although not exactly, since the speeedometer goes to 120, and of course has the tachometer with it. Having said that, they will look like they could have come from VW, only modern and giving you a complete set of gauges to monitor everything.

The gauge panel has the gauges in the exact same spots, so visibility will be just as good as with stock gauges. They will be recessed back like the stock gauges as well.

One thing to note, is the pictures of the prototype panels, show them in white, but that is just the color of the filament I used to print them. They won't be white in the production version.

See the pictures of the panels.

I would like to know if there is interest in this product idea. I have included a poll to make that easy, but all comments are welcome.

This product would be fairly expensive to put into production, so I don't want to go much beyond what I have already done without getting some good feedback.

Thanks everyone!

[ivwshane]

Why so high on the rpm and mph? No matter what engine you have in a bus you won’t be going over 100mph, it’s just not safe and those that would are so minimal that I’m guessing it would be a one off.

What about the odometer or a trip counter?
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[andrig's]

[airschooled]

Your design doesn't have to go as high as the gauges…


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[skills@eurocarsplus]

i hand make these

next to volvo 240 owners (most) bay window owners are the cheapest pricks on the planet. i can 100% get behind your idea....because if your futzing with this i can almost bet how many hours you have into it and i would LOVE an off the shelf product so i didn't have to bury 3 days into making my cluster.

that said.... i would only offer these on a made to order basis. no way would i go thru the trouble to do this and only sell 1 a year....if you're lucky.

speedhut is good shit. way better than vdo, autometer etc. total underdogs in the gauge world and always have a line a mile long to get their stuff.

i like your idea. good luck!
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[aeromech]

You hand made that? Did you also make the water temp gauge crooked?

Just kidding, I wish I had your big head. Just kidding, I wish I had your talent.
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[alman72]

[andrig's]

[andrig's]

[skills@eurocarsplus]

[andrig's]

he's talking about the spacing between the numbers which isn't editable in speedhuts gauges.

Okay, I got it.

Actually, I did change the tick marks and the way the numbers are on the gauges.

Of course the reason for going to 120 mph and 8k on the tach, is that is what their lowest end gauge combination is.

They won't let me change the internal electronics, that's for sure.

For all the buses that I have seen with high powered air cooled and water cooled engines in them, I have gotten two comments about the speedometer going to 120 and the tach going to 8k.

While I know these vehicles in stock trim don't go very fast. When I was a very little kid we owned a split window bus that had the 1200 cc 40 hp type 1 engine. It could only go 55, and that was on a flat surface with no wind and wide open throttle.

But, so many people modify these vehicles, and if you spend the money on a really nice engine and hopefully upgrade the suspension and brakes, but you still want a speedo that says 80 or 90 on it, that works with a cable to the front wheel, doesn't make a lot of sense to me. And you only want idiot lights, instead of proper readings for the most important parts of your high powered engine?

Having built custom cars, I always wanted the best instrumentation for all the systems, since I spent so much money on all of it.

If you put custom wheels and tires, or change gear ratios in the transaxle because of your nice high performance engine, which so many do, your speedometer won't read right. The GPS speedometers don't care about any of that, and in my experience they read quite accurately. I have one in a '73 Beetle that I custom built, and in a '66 Karmann Ghia that I built.

[andrig's]

[Mberglo]

You might consider centering the voltmeter on 14 volts rather than 12.

[andrig's]

[SGKent]

you need to demonstrate that the concept works and is highly reliable before anyone will consider it. We have enough trouble with tach needles bouncing (there are fixes), all the year variants of fuel gauges that are going bad and being way off when replaced, things like that. Until you can put one of your designs in YOUR bus, and maybe a couple friends, who can test it and show that it is reliable over 50,000 miles and 4 - 5 years, folks aren't going to go to the trouble of replacing things only to encounter even more problems and lack of support. Just my 2 cents worth.
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[andrig's]

[SGKent]

[andrig's]

[alman72]

i would be interested in a cluster that has space on the far right for 3 or 4 of the small gauges like Skills used in his mod. I would like to keep my stock fuel gauge, and speedo, but the far right blank, or clock hole, is great space for a temp gauge or oil pressure, or volts, but you only get to choose one.

[andrig's]