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Building my own dash - advice please
Blue Fox - 9/10/08 at 06:29 PM

Hello,

Another little project in the warm for the winter!

I am thinking of building my own dash using seven segment number displays for speed and rpm and led bar graphs for fuel level, water temp etc. I have the drawings for the electronic circuits for this that should work, and have plenty of soldering experience (work as an electrical engineer) but am unsure of how to mount all these to make them look "pretty" in a car, as am used to mounting things like this in grey plastic boxes for machines where as long as its neat and tidy all is ok, has anyone done this before and if so how did you mount them - pics would be good. Or if you have any better ideas then let me know.

YQUSTA - 9/10/08 at 07:08 PM

You could mount them on a plastic pannel then cover that with a clear sheet of plastic.

To hide the bits without gauges you could use some window tint.

I would be interested in the bar fuel guage as I have been looking for 1 but they only seam to be for sale in the USA.

YQUSTA

blakep82 - 9/10/08 at 09:26 PM

quote:
Originally posted by YQUSTA
I would be interested in the bar fuel guage as I have been looking for 1 but they only seam to be for sale in the USA.

YQUSTA


mmm me too

coozer - 9/10/08 at 09:30 PM

My Acewell has bar fuel gauge BUT I'd rather have a normal gauge.

To me a normal 270 type gaue gives a better indication how much go is left in the tank. With the Ace I tend to put more in when it gets down to the second off borrom bar. May just be a home made car thing....

:{THC}:YosamiteSam - 10/10/08 at 05:11 AM

or you could get some 1..2 mm ally sheet and use that - brush it to give a hi fi look - looks well cool. my rush had it like that - got lots and lots of comments of how well it looked

David Jenkins - 10/10/08 at 07:41 AM

I was thinking of doing that - I'd even made the thing - but in the end I decided that I wanted to drive the car, not faff around with electronics!

I was going to emulate the dash on my Yaris, which has the display down a 'tunnel', some form of lens in front so you don't have to change your eye focus when you look away from the road, and a curved plastic screen that prevents reflections. Sounds complicated, but it isn't really... have a look at a Yaris to see what I mean.

02GF74 - 10/10/08 at 08:45 AM

quote:
Originally posted by YQUSTA
You could mount them on a plastic pannel then cover that with a clear sheet of plastic.



I concur.

7 segment displays have moulded legs so in theory they should be mounted same distance from the board - it wouldn't take too much to get the top faces misaligned so the clear plastic will hide that effect.

I know for sure you can buy 2 digit displays - you are better off using one of those than 2 single units if you want it to look nice.

I would query if you really want a digital display - a dial and guage is far easier to read .

contaminated - 10/10/08 at 09:09 AM

I may have some stuff that will help and may swap parts for expertise!

Dan

contaminated - 10/10/08 at 09:25 AM

Sorry there should have been a link with that!

http://www.photobox.co.uk/album/72510380

Blue Fox - 11/10/08 at 07:32 PM

Thanks for the tips guys, I like the idea of the plastic and the window tint. Wasn't sure about the ally dash incase I got blinded when the sun hit it?