One foil, two foil, bad foil, good foil

Oh, the dreaded blue foil.  Yes, the delicate and no longer available blue foil.

Had to delve into this today.  Little wisp of smoke yesterday tells me nothing good can happen by ignoring it.

Here is the major problem

My reaching into the dash caused this de lamination and the metal to cross over itself and arc.

So it was time to replace the foil.  Luckily, I had another tach foil in the garage.  So I started the surgery, being extremely cautious not to tweak the foil in any way that could harm it.  I got them switched over and gave it a try.  Still no gauges, or clock but the indicator lamps worked. It's a step in the right direction. 

There is a small voltage regulator on the rear of the tach. Tiny little thing.  Looks like this

It is known to create mischief.  I tried three of them and best I could get is gas and temp gauges, but no clock. I will order a new one and see.  When I tried the clocks directly connected to a battery, they worked.  Once the screw is removed, the regulator can slide out easily.

While I had the tach out, and was disassembling the cluster anyway, I went ahead on modified the tach for the Bostig. I had an 85 tach in it which does not require modification, but the foil I just took out was a bit fused to the tach.  So I swapped the while thing over for a tach and foil from an 87. So now I needed to modify the tach.

Bostig breaks it down pretty well, but here is a shot of the board in the tach.  

The one over the whole towards the bottom center got changed.  There is another on the right, just to the left of the light blue / brown striped one. That one gets removed entirely.

The other thing that needed to get completed while the cluster was out is the placement of the MIL light and the Low Oil light.  After much consternation, deliberation and research of what others had done, I wanted a stock look.

Decided to use the unused lower location beneath the high beam for the MIL light, and after carving out the existing LED for oil, I placed the new oil light in its place.

That's right, I modified the blue foil!  Well, I tried it on the old one first to make sure it could be done.

Carved off the port for the mid light, and the unattached lower port.  

And then modified the front piece.  Only required little changes, but a dab of black silicone to keep the new lights in place. 

After it was assembled, it looks great.  And nearly stock.  

Still need to run the wires up front and connect for a full light test, but I am pleased with how it came out.