Mounting your electronics

Part #7 -- Mounting your Electronics

Ok, the dash is in and now you need to mount all your gauges, TV, and what ever else you decided to install. This is where things start to really come together.

My VDO gauges used what they called "spin lock" it was just a thick plastic ring on the back of the gauges that screwed on to secure the gauge. This was the smartest design I believe, someone was actually thinking when they designed them. All I did was pop them in their holes and lock down the ring. After they were mounted to the Plexiglas there was the long and tedious task of wiring them all up, it took several hours to install all the senders and run the wires, but it was pretty simple. I wont go in to detail about this because there are several types of gauges and several types of ways to wire them, just read and follow the instructions that come with them. One note on gauges, if you get the kind that has the metal strap (or plate) on the back to secure them it would be a mandatory to put a piece of cardboard where the metal contacts the Plexiglas so the metal wont scratch the paint or plastic. Also never over tighten a fastener because it may just crack your piece of Plexiglas. Don't forget to wire up some turn signal indicators and high beam indicator or you'll wish you did.

After every gauge and light was wired up I simply placed the whole Plexiglas assembly in to the hole in the dash and secured it with small sheet metal screws, being careful not to crack anything.

The voice box was pretty simple also, all I did was line it up in it's hole and screw down the coat hanger supports to the holes that were already drilled.

Next is the second most asked question I get in e-mail, " How did you mount your TV ? "

First I masked off the picture tube on the TV, and painted the whole thing the same color as the finish coat of the dash.

From there it's pretty simple, I stuck the TV in the hole I made and placed 1" thick strips of hard wood around it, gluing the wood to the dash with construction adhesive. After the glue dries over night I used 3 small "L" brackets screwed in to the wood and the plastic case of the TV. If you screw anything in to the TV case you need to make sure that it ante going to hit anything inside, such as a picture tube, flyback coil or wire, and circuit boards. Just use small short screws, take it apart to see if your going to hit something if your not sure. Oh yeah- it's illegal to have a functioning TV in view of the driver any where in the US, so keep that in mind.

Everything was just spiffy with the TV for about 3 months, then after going to my car one day I found that the TV had fallen out, the glue didn't bond correctly. Seems that there was loose fiberglass particles where I put the glue so it couldn't bond completely and it failed. So I found myself some small screws and screwed the wood back to where it was suppose to be from the front of the dash, making sure to drill pilot holes in the fiberglass and counter sink the heads of the screws. Now I can guarantee that it wont ever fall out. So I hope this answers everyone's question about how I did it.

At this point everything should be in the dash, it's probably pretty dirty in there it's time for some final work......

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