Help Removing the dash around the spedometer!

[Stooks]

Anyone able to help me with removing the spedometer dash?
Some tips? :doh:
I know it just unscrews and snaps off but before I wanted to know if anyone had any trouble doing so.
My plan is to place some blue LED lights behind the spedometer to change the color!

thanks!! :bow:




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Noone likes a dirty box.

[xB_Crew]

there is basically one plastic screw type fatener under the center top of the trim piece, over the warning light area.. unscrew that, remove it.. and pop off the rest.. as far as changing LED's... I hired out....lol

[Big_Bird]

^^Yerp, the little plastic screw, take that out. Then just grip it well and pull it out. It's very simple. The boxes are build like a lego set, just snap-unsnap.

[IH8ONYU]

if all that you want to do is change the color of the speedo and you don't want the hassle of changing tiny led's, you can get some colored "gels" used in movie and stage lighting and put that behind the guage face.. it is very quick and easy. just cut the plastic film to fit, and lay it under the guage face, install your guage face and needles and you are all set. the "gels" won't oxidize over time or get lighter in color. the only time you will see the change is at night when you turn the lights on. If you want to do the spedo and clock though, you are SOL with this method, you will have to solder new led's in.

hope this helps, feel free to pm if you have questions on the "colored gel" method. Gels can be had in just about any color and can be "stacked" to get most colors - red + blue, blue+ yellow, etc.. I usually get my friends who work on stage lighting to get me some, but you can get that at any music store that sells "dj lighting", over the internet, or what a few friends have done, gone to their local highschool drama dept and asked for 1 to cut up.. they are basically colored heavy guage plastic film..

[UV7]

Everyone's pretty well said it.
Remove one screw from the cover and pull the cover up and towards you. It will pop off.
Remove three screws that hold in the speedo/clock assembly and pull it out towards you.
Unclip the wire harness from the back of the speedo/clock assembly.
The assembly can now be removed from the car and taken to a clean, dry location for modification.
From here, you can begin removing the necessary pieces to gain access to what you need. If you only want to modify the gauge face and/or add an LED ring to the speedo, then you need to remove the bezel and needles to gain access to the face.
There are a few tabs that hold the speedo bezel to the assembly. Simply unclip them and remove the bezel.
The needles can be easily removed using a small flat-head screwdriver or other flat utensil to pry the needles up, one at a time. A salad fork works very nicely. Pay close attention to where the needles are pointing before removal. You will want to make sure they are pointing at the same location during reassembly.
If you intend to solder new LEDs in place of the stock amber LEDs, then you will need to take the rest of the speedo assembly apart. There are 4 screws and several tabs that hold the back cover to the speedo assembly. Once they are removed and the cover is taken off, you will need to disconnect the ribbon cable, pry up the metal tab holding the board in place and begin removing the circuit boards from the assembly. The circuit boards are held in place by tabs in the assembly itself.
Once the boards are out, you can remove and replace the LEDs to a color of your choosing. While your at it, you might as well change the 4 1604 LEDs that light up the clock LCD display.
Re-assembly is just the reversal of these same steps.
The entire procedure is not as complicated as it sounds, as long as you are familiar with soldering surface-mount components. Removal, disassembly, LED change, and reassembly only takes about an hour or so, depending on your soldering skill. Just take your time and make sure everything is clean.