pulled a few needles out of 1st gen SC junkers looking for some good ones for my 92 SC400. They are diffferent! Early ones are orange (none lit up on test), later ones are red (all 4 lit up). also the later ones are not unique in polarity, early ones are (tach and speedo are opposite polarity) The later ones dont light up in the dash but they do test OK on a 9V, full illumination. I tested voltage on my 92 pins and im getting 19v! WTH? (Found out there are 12V, my DMM had a low battery) I can put 2 small resistors in the needle and change their polarity to get them down to 6V but Im wondering if I have a bad cap on the cluster to give me 19V! Possibly the red later needle dashes were 5V regulated at the pins while the early ones had a diffferent voltage drop across the LEDs inseries to account for the massive voltage presence? If someone can check the pin voltage on a 92 that would be great or else Im going in with a meter and finding what the issue is.

>>>PS>>> tested the needle voltages again with dimmer connected and I got 12V across the board this time. Not sure what I did wrong last time but that is more believable. '94 red needles still seem to be backwards in polartiy, that is a proven yes. I can put the 94 reds on the 92 speedo and tach 180 degrees out and they light up no problem. I just have to reverse the polarity of the needle connections. my idea is to isolate the LED leads where the spring connectors clamp on and cross the wires in the needles themselves. Just some very small busy work with a very light iron.

 

i used to rebuild needles and cluster lights and i've never seen 19V at the needle poles, there's something really wrong happening there.

 

whats the stock voltage supposed to be?

 

Doesn’t sound like you understand how the circuit works. Unplug the dimmer and watch what happens. find a working set of needles and you’ll be set. Overthinking. Any threads around the era of the “ice blue” thread have lots of information, but a majority of info is in that thread. Not that you need it, nothing is wrong but bad needles.

 

Ps- bumping threads from 9 years ago asking the op to do something is not productive. You won’t get a response, most users from a decade ago don’t even have their car and surely don’t have the issue ten years later. You have a thread here to work from. I understand you have an issue, that’s what your thread is for. you really do not though, other than having the same dead needles everyone else has. You can rebuild them as seen in the ice blue thread or you can try and find working ones.

 

Educate me on this circuit, pwm? Iirc 19v was detected with dimmer unplugged but I'll check again tonight. I have a set of working red needles tested with a 9v. They do not work on my 92 pins. Tested old needles with same 9v, nothing. Also red needles polarity is same speedo and tach while the 92 cluster polarity for speedo/tach is reversed. Since they both sweep left to right you would think they would be the same so they could use the same needle but it looks not to be the case in 92?. Do we know year when they changed to red needles from orange? Mine was orange from day 1, original fuel needle still works in orange. Thanks for any info.
>>PS>> speedo/tach polarity is same needle to needle, but reversed from 92 to 94.

 

Red needles are '94-96.

 

Thanks! I have the same Garnet pearl 92 that you have in your sig. so 92-93 model years were only 2 years for orange needles and associated polarity dash. Good to know.

 

There are some mid-'94 changes that may defy the above rules. I think it had to do with both HVAC illumination and gauge needles.

 

HVAC illumination? Interesting as I lost that when I replaced my LCD. I wonder if I grabbed the wrong year HVAC control unit? I replaced LCD with new in it so it is clear but I never got the backlight back.

 

I've yet to see a '94 MY that had '92-93 needles or '95-96 orange backlit HVAC/Headunit, however I could be wrong. Curious to see if any '94 owners could shed some light on this?

 

It's been 4 or 5 years, so I'm pretty hazy on the details of the conversation -- can't even remember if it was here in the forum or by email -- but my '94 didn't fit the general convention and Tanin told me it was a weird switchover year, with some cars matching the adjacent year ('95, I think).

 

Do you remember what the pin voltage was? Ill mod to fix or find out whats supercharging my voltage.....

 

anyone know where to find 92 SC400 dash cluster wiring diagram? The 2 posts had expired links and/or invalid pics. The internet is forever......except when links break.

 

Success, found out you can use 94 needles in a 92, you just have to cross the contacts in the needles to have them work. These are 94 needles in a 92 dash. I cut the L shaped contacts on the needles and crossed a light wire from the pin socket to the opposite LED contact an they worked fine. They are red LED's under a red needle as opposed to 92's orange LED's under a clear needle.