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Gauge Pod DIY

I’ve always been curious about when the super-charger actually kicks in. How do you know if some other modification is actually adding power? There’s always the “butt-dyno” but that isn’t very reliable. I thought it would be nice to see boost pressure and see what happens under various conditions. I started looking at what was on the market to add some gauges around the tachometer. I found many offerings online offering a gauge pod which sells for about $150 by itself, a couple of gauges, and the necessary wiring harness. Since I’m always mucking about with the electrical system of the car adding or changing one gizmo or another, I thought it would be nice to have a voltmeter as well. The complete kit was selling for about $380 and dealers are charging a couple of hours of labor to install it, so I set off to see what I could do for less.

I found was the Autometer Ultra-light series of gauges. They fit in nicely with the MINI gauge design. Autometer sells black mounting cups which are possible to attach directly to the back of the tachometer (with slight modification for the 2 1/16 inch size cup mounts) but I wanted something more secure. So I built my own mounting bracket.

cluster1

The tachometer has two screws in the mounting holes in the back that have to be replaced with longer ones to hold the mount. A word of caution here: the mounts are just plastic so don’t over tighten. I decided to angle the mounting cups to get them a bit below center axis when viewed from the front.

cluster2

I had to build my own wiring harness and route the vacuum hose through the firewall to pick up the vacuum/boost pressure at the pressure regulator under the intercooler. It pulls power and ground from the cigarette lighter plug. It is also hooked into the dimmer loop so the lights of the gauges light and dim just like the rest of the instruments. I picked up that line at the cigarette lighter plug as well.

cluster3

So what was the total cost? I was able to buy the gauges and gauge pods at Summit Racing. (They even gave me a free hat.) The pods were $13 each. The voltmeter was about $35. The boost/vacuum gauge was $52, but I got a $20 off coupon in my first order for the voltmeter, so effectively it was only $32. I spent about $4 at the hardware store buying aluminum stock and various fasteners. Excluding shipping costs, that makes my total $97.