HOW TO: Fix Bouncy/Hummingbird Fuel Gauge Needle

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kennythewelder

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So I worked on my Denali cluster today. I need to re cal the gauge needles. I also went through the air stepper motors. The fuel motor is wired different than any of the other motors are. It is the only motor with 1 wire on 2 of the legs, , and 2 wires on 1 of the other legs. Than means there is 1 leg with no wire on it at all. All of the other motor have 1 wire per leg. By leg, I am talking about the 4 prongs that stick out of the back of the motors, and make contact to the cluster housing. So long story short, No you can not simply swap the resistors around. The motors are not interchangeable.
 

kennythewelder

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Stock. No leds not yet anyway. Not sure of I will swap over. The OE bulbs are OK.
 
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Darrin De May

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Its a ground issue most likely. The way the fuel gauge works, is from the ground side of the circuit. The better the ground, the more the it shows full. Less ground = empty. I would look for a pinched wire somewhere between the fuel tank, and the cluster that feeds the fuel gauge motor. IMO your picking up to much ground in that circuit.

That sounds like a cheaper problem to fix than replacing the fuel pump / sending unit! Makes me wish I had a lift in my garage, though.
 

Darrin De May

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Stock. No leds not yet anyway. Not sure of I will swap over. The OE bulbs are OK.

While I had my instrument cluster out to replace the fuel gauge aircore motor, I swapped the six background bulbs with single-LED replacements. They're not as bright as the stock bulbs, and they make the lit cluster look blue. Not sure if I'm going to go back to the incandescents or go with multi-LED bulbs.

 

kennythewelder

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I was looking at some white cob led bulds. My coworker has been fooling with leds on his Dodge. He says they are nothing but trouble. How have they been in your cluster? I got the Denali cluster about a week ago. I have had it in and out several times, fooling with the stepper motors. I will need to replace the fule motor in time, but its ok for now. I had to swap in my motors from my OE cluster as the Denal clusters motors were all bad expect for the temp gauge. No biggie. Its not like I was going to use the OE cluster again anyway.
 

Darrin De May

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The LEDs have been in my cluster for several weeks and work okay, other than being a bit dim, as I mentioned. I'm much happier with the brightness from the underdash, glovebox, ashtray and dome light LEDs, especially the underdash and dome lights. I like the bright white light versus the yellowish light that the incandescent bulbs give off.
 

Mildphil

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While I had my instrument cluster out to replace the fuel gauge aircore motor, I swapped the six background bulbs with single-LED replacements. They're not as bright as the stock bulbs, and they make the lit cluster look blue. Not sure if I'm going to go back to the incandescents or go with multi-LED bulbs.

You need to purchase LEDs with a warm white color temperature. Also make sure that it has an actual built in driver instead of a cheap resistors set up like most have. A true driver will have some sort of inverter on the board, since it is essentially a fixed output step-up converter with variable input. The variation in voltage and current will kill the average led with a simple resistor.
 

Mildphil

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These are what I use, you can see the little inverter and a ceramic cap on the boards in the second photo. I only have two in and it is bright enough to light up the entire panel. One more and it would be completely even, it os just slightly darker towards the bottom right guages due to where I located the bulbs. Good LEDs with proper drivers will be more expensive, but they will work. Buy once cry once. I like them since the have less load on the wires and dump less heat into the old brittle plastic.
US $4.92 31%OFF | 2x T10 168 194 W5W LED 3030 Chip Replacement Bulbs Car License Plate Lights Parking Lights Halogen Warm White/Blue/Red DC12V https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/cZRTdW7Q

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