I pulled off the whole steering column on my 1995 T-Bird to be able to pull out the gauge cluster with ease. Odometer stopped ticking because of a cheap plastic gear. Thanks Ford!!!!! You build a pretty solid vehicle, and you couldn’t put a decent, solid gear that doesn’t buckle under the extreme heat and cold inside your instrument panels??!!! Oh, and btw, the 4R70W AOD transmission had a short lifespan, once you feel it shuddering!!!! I had to use TCI Performance parts to offset the shoddy garbage parts from Ford, to make it great again!!!!
Very interesting video. Good that you went all the way fixing the issue instead of just replacing the part. If you ever plan on doing another project: many of these Contis have an issue with airconditioning and the AC blend door thats malfunctioning. Ford came up with a TSB to fix this, but the dash needs to be removed.
@@070nino070 Luckily, I've never had an issue with the blend doors on mine. Usually, when someone comes at me with a blend door issue, I tell them to live with it because I don't want to be responsible for all the broken clips that may occur if I have to take out their dash.
im a bit late to this but the service manual says to drop the steering column so the cluster clears, apparently its only held on by 2 nuts and just drops down. edit: i was wrong, theres actually 4 nuts. regardless, still faster than cutting that tab.
It only took me like 3 mins to cut the tab. I did try to drop the column by loosening two screws for the tilt, but I was afraid after I loosened the spring tension for the tilt, it would be difficult to get it back. So that's why I decided to cut the tab. After I cut the tab, I just tilted the steering all the way down and it came out, no problem. There's probably another location to loosen the column further down but I didn't really pursue it. I'd say cutting the tab would have to be quicker than unbolting it though.
@@SmartSped1984 yep its held down in 2 locations, an impact driver made quick work of them as they werent very tight right now im stuck trying to get the cluster to clear the top of the dashboard, would you happen to have any tips for that? do you just have to fight it until it works?
@@32VInTechV8 Push it back in like you're installing it back to the way it was, and maneuver the top part of the cluster past the screw mounts on the dash first by pulling both down and towards you.. Then you should be able to pull the bottom out and it should clear. It's so tight in there that you have to clear the top first before you move it any other way
@@SmartSped1984if you just fixed this resoldering it fixed the glitching of the instrument cluster, also I appreciate the advice, also didn’t see this was just posted sorry 😂
I pulled off the whole steering column on my 1995 T-Bird to be able to pull out the gauge cluster with ease. Odometer stopped ticking because of a cheap plastic gear. Thanks Ford!!!!! You build a pretty solid vehicle, and you couldn’t put a decent, solid gear that doesn’t buckle under the extreme heat and cold inside your instrument panels??!!!
Oh, and btw, the 4R70W AOD transmission had a short lifespan, once you feel it shuddering!!!! I had to use TCI Performance parts to offset the shoddy garbage parts from Ford, to make it great again!!!!
Very interesting video. Good that you went all the way fixing the issue instead of just replacing the part. If you ever plan on doing another project: many of these Contis have an issue with airconditioning and the AC blend door thats malfunctioning. Ford came up with a TSB to fix this, but the dash needs to be removed.
@@070nino070 Luckily, I've never had an issue with the blend doors on mine. Usually, when someone comes at me with a blend door issue, I tell them to live with it because I don't want to be responsible for all the broken clips that may occur if I have to take out their dash.
@@SmartSped1984 yep I get that. unfortunately its hard to live without any A/C these days…
Very interesting.
how did you get the cluster to clear the top of the dashboard? unfortunately i cant seem to get it
Interesting
im a bit late to this but the service manual says to drop the steering column so the cluster clears, apparently its only held on by 2 nuts and just drops down.
edit: i was wrong, theres actually 4 nuts. regardless, still faster than cutting that tab.
It only took me like 3 mins to cut the tab. I did try to drop the column by loosening two screws for the tilt, but I was afraid after I loosened the spring tension for the tilt, it would be difficult to get it back. So that's why I decided to cut the tab. After I cut the tab, I just tilted the steering all the way down and it came out, no problem.
There's probably another location to loosen the column further down but I didn't really pursue it. I'd say cutting the tab would have to be quicker than unbolting it though.
@@SmartSped1984 yep its held down in 2 locations, an impact driver made quick work of them as they werent very tight
right now im stuck trying to get the cluster to clear the top of the dashboard, would you happen to have any tips for that? do you just have to fight it until it works?
@@32VInTechV8 Push it back in like you're installing it back to the way it was, and maneuver the top part of the cluster past the screw mounts on the dash first by pulling both down and towards you.. Then you should be able to pull the bottom out and it should clear.
It's so tight in there that you have to clear the top first before you move it any other way
@@SmartSped1984 took a few hours of messing with it, but i was eventually able to get it. appreciate the response!
I understand this was almost 20 years ago but do you know if this was making the battery die, lol if you don’t remember that’s fair
I actually just fixed this issue. The battery was fine. Never had an issue. I'd suggest looking up videos on "parasitic draw"to narrow it down
@@SmartSped1984if you just fixed this resoldering it fixed the glitching of the instrument cluster, also I appreciate the advice, also didn’t see this was just posted sorry 😂