True Connections

While attending cruise nights and car shows, we noticed that instead of staying bone stock, many Chevelle and El Camino owners restore or customize their cars to suit their own tastes. When it comes time to restore the dash, the need to customize usually crosses paths with the need to monitor engine vitals more accurately than a warning light. To that end we recently became a dealer for Dakota Digital so we can now offer the best of both worlds, without hacking away at your dash. The Dakota Digital gauge clusters give you a fluorescent digital readout with an entire range of colors for that custom modern look along with an accurate reading of all important information. Most of the Dakota Digital gauge clusters even come with the factory style dash bezel or housing so it is a direct bolt in installation exactly like your factory cluster. On certain year Chevelles and El Caminos the factory housing is not available reproduction, so it is necessary to use your existing housing and install the gauge lenses from the back. As far as hooking up the gauges themselves, it is as simple as you can get. A ribbon harness that is attached to the gauge cluster, plugs into a microprocessor based control box that comes in the kit. This Electronic Control Module (ECM) is a fairly small unit and can easily be mounted under the dash. From there, the instruction booklet tells you which wires on your existing dash harness need to be clipped and inserted into a specific hole in the terminal block on the ECM. All that’s left is setting up your system through a series of menus and you’re done. Now when Dakota Digital says their systems are complete, you can believe it. The clusters come with a 0-255 mph speedometer, 0-8000 rpm bar graph tachometer, 0-18,000 numeric tachometer, 0-80 psi oil pressure, 0-300 F water temperature, 8-17 volt voltmeter, 0-99% fuel level gauge, 0-999.9 mile odometer/trip odometer, built in turn signal, high beam, parking brake, wait to start, cruise, gear shift position for automatic transmissions and check engine indicators. Also included is a re-settable service meter, 0-60 mph timer, high speed recall, ¼ mile timer, end of ¼ mile speed, high rpm recall, and rpm warning which flashes “SHIFT” when exceeded, automatic night dimming, adjustable brightness control, and user adjustable warning points. If this isn’t enough to satisfy the most information hungry Chevelle enthusiast out there, I don’t know what is. And just so you don’t have to go chasing parts all over town, the oil pressure sender, water temp sender, and speed sensor also come with the kit. The ease of installation and features available make this a truly unique aftermarket accessory. Next month we are going to go over a couple new reproduction items coming out soon.