Old Library

All you need is a phillips screwdriver, and something to pry off trim pieces
(i used a butter knife :)

First off, you need to pop off the little plastic piece to the left of the
headlight switch.

Then you pop off another plastic piece to the left of the radio....(i had
two, people with heated seats only have one...if you have two, pop the
leftmost one off.) you should see a screw

Next you have to remove the headlight switch..to do this, reach in the first
hole you made and in the upper right corner is a  tab you have to push in
while you retract the headlight switch...
Pull it out about an inch and then disconnect the wire harness. notice there
is a screw that was hidden on the right side.

Next, you have to remove the plastic "collar" that spaces the steering wheel
from the dash...this piece is actually two; one on top, one on bottom....To
remove it, there are two screws on the bottom piece that are screwed
inverted into the top piece. ONce you remove the screws, just pull the
bottom piece down, and then after the are seperated, remove the top.

ATTEN: USE STEERING WHEEL ADJUSTER TO LOWER IT ALL THE WAY
Now you are ready to remove the cosmetic piece that surrounds the instrument
cluster. This is held in by the two hidden screws you uncovered from
removing trim/headlight switch. Once you unscrew them, the piece will not
come out easily..this is because there are plastic tabs holding it
back...easiest way to remove it (without snapping the tabs) is to use your
fingers on the bottom edge, and lift up and pull out..if it is hard to grab,
there is a tab that could help you out that sticks down from the bottom
edge....kinda hard to explain..just trust your feeling...
you will hear a SNAP (or two) and it should come out smooth (it is annoying
to get out through the space between the dash and steering wheel, but the
easiest way is to tilt it 45 degrees toward you and pull out at that angle.

Now, (whew) you should see two screws holding the instrument cluster in.
These are in the upper corners. be careful to not let these screws fall into
the dash, nor the holder for them.....i used a magnetic screw driver...you
will notice the steering wheel makes it hard to manipulate the screwdriver,
but i didnt want to remove it (i am afraid of explosions)... once the screws


are removed, tilt the cluster (from the top) towards you slowly....once you
feel resistance, pull up more to remove the bottom pegs from their
holders...trust me, you will see what i am talking about....once the pegs
are free, the instrument cluster can recess into the dash more...this lets
you see the two wire harnesses in the back (left side) there should be a
white one and a red one....the harnesses are clipped in from the top, so
remove the upper one, then the lower one.... all that's left is to pull the
instrument cluster out!

NOTE: to put it back follow instructions in reverse order...but, when you
are putting it back into the dash, make sure that the wire harnesses "click"
(to show they are conencted).


Side note: i had bland black gauges, and replaced it with the silver
one...my dealer did it for me so it would be legal..(the odom.), but since
my car is blue, i got creative....i removed the ugly green film from the top
and replaced it with blue film from a strobe light.....the blue light looks
really nice on the silver gauges...


Hope this is helpful!

Michael.

ps. if anyone knows how to change the color of the clock and odo/trip,
please tell me!


[...]

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[...]

> 3) my speedometer/tachometer/etc. backlight went out about a month after I
> got the car.
> Talked to a repair shop, they said they'd have to do something fancy
> involving the air bag, and that it would be very expensive to fix. ? Is
> this true? I can't see my instrument panel at night, and that SUCKS.

Oh man, is that a crock of sh&t.  The speedo comes off in, oh, about 10 minutes.  The
heated seat control thing, and air-bag light piece (I have a 95) need to be popped off
first.  There's two screws behind them.  YOu might want to unplug these for easier
acces-  try not to let the plugs pop back in to far, or it's a bitch to fish out
later.  I think you have to pop out the headlight switch as well to get to one of the
bolts, the release for that is on the upper left corner-  you'll mess with it and
see.  There should be two bolts holding on the plastic rim around the speedo unit.
Two philips screws hold it in-  remove.  THen yank on the upper part of the plastic
thing, near tghe top of the speedo-  it'll release with a sickening 'pop'.  Then, two
screws will be revealed which hold the speedo in place.  The bottom is held in by two
clip-things holding in a rod.  Remember this for re-installation-  clip the rods in
before retightening/putting in screws.  Now that you've pulled off the speedo (remove
screws, pull forward)  you'll need to unclip the two plugs in the back to take it out
(or maybe not if just changing the bulb.).  On top of the speedo, there's this white
bar-thing connected with sheetmetal.  The bulb culprit should be right behind the
white bar-  find the burned out one and replace. Re-install in reverse order.  I
replaced my cluster twice-  if you live near Los Angeles, I'll do it for you. I even
changed the light filter from a green to a blue-ish tint.

[...]

-Dave

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