yea, it's really up to the user to decide. Although it is not a difficult modification and no functions are affected. I just wanted to let everyone know what the solution is. Personally, I'd only do it if I had the time.

For a cleaner look, I'd put a small piece of electrical tape behind the 180 marker so it doesn't show up at night.

 

Thanks Combat! Great pics and if all it takes is a little dremel action and super gluing a popsicle stick here and there to get 180 both day and night, that is easy enough! Awesome!

Can we expect and pics with different color backlighting and with the needles in place any time?

Keep It Up!

 

I love those second ones in red!!! Very clean . Great job combat .

 

hell yeah good job combat. PM me when you are done. ill take the blitz style CF one with the blue backlighting. very good design looks like it will be easy to read day and night. let us know when they are done

 

Wow! Thank god I found this thread! PM me when there ready to be purchased! I like the first style with the extra details. It looks cool, but for those of us who shift over 7K it's functional.

 

Hey for those of us waiting on the MR with the ACD and it's light in the tach. Just keep that in the back of your mind with these. If no better design or addition for this pops up first, I can always just drill three holes in these for the lights.

 

Everyone,

Combat just sent me the Carbon fibre look Blitz gauges so I can prototype them and write out the instructions and see what else needs to be done before we can start the group buy.

First thing I have to say is that these turned out better then I could imagine, the pictures do not do these things justice at all. It was a very simple install that took a total of 20 minutes. I did run into some difficulties with recalibrating the needles, but an HKS turbo timer type one truly made it much easier. At first I thought the markings must be off, but the markings are exactly the same as the stock gauges. I will make sure to include in the instructions that everyone will get with these on how to calibrate the needles, I just need to think of ways for those without extra instrumentation to assist.

One of the reasons he sent them to me was to try out the stock lighting with these gauges, because using the EL wires will add a significant cost and additional complexity to the installation. Unfortunately once it got dark and I turned on the gauges, what was supposed to be blue (like the picture) came out as aqua-green. I'm going to attack the cluster tomorrow and see if the stock bulbs have condoms on them in order to increase the stock orange/red look. I have been told that there are, so hopefully a whiter light will make them more blue at night. Without messing with anything, the stock lighting is acceptable for night use, however they are night as bright as the center console lighting. So hopefully there are condoms on the lights and taking them off will make things brighter.

I will take pictures this weekend and post them up, so you can see them installed and with the needles and the results of my little experiment with the lighting. We'd really like these to work with the stock lighting so that their is a simple install, but right now for those of you that want the really bright lighting the EL wiring looks to be your best bet. If it turns out that the EL wiring is the only acceptable way we want to light these gauges we will do our best to include them with the gauges, otherwise if we can get appropriate lighting using the stock cluster lighting then we will just make the EL wire an option or tell you what you will need and how to get the EL stuff.

I want to thank everyone for their patience, this has been a long process and Combat is doing an awesome job. There is a lot of time and money invested into these, but we will only need to sell 25 to break even and I think everyone will be extremely pleased with the end result.

I have a spreadsheet of everyone that has either posted they are interested and/or PM'd me that they are interested. When we get the OK (from evom) to start the gb and we have worked out all of the kinks, those people will be at the top of the list and the first to get their gauges.

 

that sounds awesome, thanks for the update.

you could probably just use an exacto knife to make a mark on the needles and the pins so you can just line up the marks to calibrate them.

 

Put me down for the EL package in RED!

 

Combat you have any pictures with the EL wire? what options will be available? I'm looking for a light orange like on the BMW M3's

nice job...


Brett

 

Nice work. Good timing too. The Ralliart Gauges are way to expensive and there really are no other alternatives. My vote is for #1.

 

All the pictures I've posted use white EL wire for backlighting. I have yet to try other colors, but I plan to. Right now, with the white EL wire, I basically spray the back of the gauge faces with a color tint. But it might be easier with colored EL wire. I'll post results once I have them.

Bryan

 

yes i think spraying the color on the gauges is better then changing the light color. So now I'm assuming that you can basically make anycolor backlighting correct? If you saw the new BMW gauges the light orange is a nice color; thats what i'm looking for

 

Emulous the stock bulbs for the cluster lighting have blue condoms on the white bulbs.

 

I have a question i have changed all the bulbs in my car to a nice red, from the key ign, clock, radio, a/c, headlight level, ic sprayer, i would like thse insturment covers but want to keep it red.