Speedometer Fixes ================= Edits and additional hints by: [Mark Wendt] See also the FAQ for VDO's US number. Jan ========================================================================== From: pbw@chong.dseg.ti.com (Pat Willems (@chong)) Subject: Fixing Jetta Odometer To: jan@UG.EDS.COM Cc: pbw@chong.dseg.ti.com Message-Id: <9503221833.AA00526@chong.dseg.ti.com> X-Envelope-To: JAN@FSHPP1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT Status: RO How I fixed my odometer (85 plain-Jane Jetta). Disclaimers: This is my 85 Jetta, your VW may be different. This fixed my problem, it may not be your problem. Of course YMMV and you get what you pay for. Time: 1/2 day if you've never had it apart before and don't have instructions. 1 1/2 hours if you've done it before. Costs: None. If you don't have a Bentley for your car it may be worth the cost since the pictures help somewhat (although the verbage is lacking). Steps 1) Remove lower utility tray on LH side of car under the dashboard. The tray is attached to the dashboard and center console with 4 - 5 screws and covers the fuse/relay box. 2) Remove radio. 3) Pull fan knob and heater knobs off. 4) Pry off heater/AC control face plate. Unplug connectors on back side. Be very careful with the fan switch as its retainer is kind of tricky (I broke mine and had to glue back together). 5) Remove light switch. My car has a dummy switch above the light switch so I pulled dummy switch out and reached in and pushed switch out. You could probably just grab the sides of the light switch and pull gently. Unplug light switch from wires. 6) Remove screws that hold instrument console cover to dashboard and remove cover. Locations that I can remember are a) one above radio b) three around heater controls c) one behind the bottom LH switch cover on RH side of steering wheel. I have a dummy switch here, don't know what really goes here on fancier cars. d) two above instrument console. e) one behind light switch. 7) Disconnect speedometer cable from back of instrument console. Reach up under the dashboard (where utility tray used to be) and grab the white plastic connector on the cable. On one side of this connector is a tang that you push in. Push tang and pull the cable off. This was pretty tough (almost as hard as getting it back on). 8) Pull console back towards steering wheel a few inches. Unplug connectors on bottom of console. Unplug them by grasping sides, squeezing and pulling. If this is too hard, use a screwdriver to gently push the connectors off (wiggle the connector first to see what part moves). 9) Everything should be disconnected so lift console out. 10) Place console on bench face down and disconnect the 2 large connectors from the bottom of the console. These were the connectors that the cables were plugged into in (8). These connectors hold the blue flex cable to the console body. They are a little tricky, wiggle them to see what moves. Using a small screwdriver, you can lift up some tabs near the front of the connector and they slide rearwards (front is the console face). 11) Remove 8 screws holding back of console on. 12) Remove small screw on back of speedometer that attaches a small connector to the speedometer. 13) Gently pry the blue flex cable off the small post on the back of the speedometer. 14) Lift the speedometer and tach assembly out of the console front. The flex cable should still be attached to the console body and the tach. The cable is also attached to the speedometer via a pin connector on the back of the speedometer. Pull the connector off the speedometer and the speedometer is free. 15) Turn speedometer over with face up. Lift speedometer needle over the pin stop and let go to determine its free position so you can put needle back in its correct position. 16) Remove speedometer needle. The needle is a plastic part that has a metal barrel at its center of rotation. This barrel is placed on a pin. Remove the needle by placing a small screwdriver under the barrel against the pin and pry upwards (gently). Needle should pop off. 17) Remove two screws holding speedometer face plate on. 18) Remove 4 screws holding the odometer mileage counters to speedometer body. This lets the odometer move around a bit. It won't lift out because the speedometer needle return spring is in the way--you don't have to lift the odometer out to fix it. 19) Lift out oil pressure control unit. This is the small circuit board surrounding the mileage counters. The unit is held in by 4 or 5 tabs that can be pulled back to release the board. 20) Note your mileage so you can reset the odometer. Study the odometer to figure out how it works. One way is to drive the system through the speedometer cable hole. I drove mine using my drill. I cut the head of a 10 penny nail and chucked the nail in the drill and shoved the nail tip in where the speedometer cable goes and pulled the trigger. I then could watch what turned and what did not turn. A description is as follows. At the back of the unit is the speedometer/odometer drive and looks like a metal can. The speedometer pin comes out of the top of this. Out of the side is a shaft with a green plastic worm gear. This gear drives a white plastic shaft that drives a red plastic gear. This red gear is on a shaft that the odometer mileage counters are on. At the opposite end of this shaft from the red gear is a potted metal gear. This metal gear was my problem. When this gear is cold, it works just fine. When the gear is warmed a bit, it slips on the shaft. One way to check this is to remove the white shaft connecting the green worm to the red shaft and spin the red gear--the mileage counters may move. Now heat up the metal potted gear with a hair dryer and try it again. The counters may not move. Also put your finger on the metal gear and spin the red gear. The metal gear may slip. How to fix. 20) Remove the shaft that the red gear is on. Put a screwdriver under the red gear and pry the shaft out of the mileage counters. I just pulled on the gear until the shaft came completely out. Careful, the counters and the metal gear could fall out. 21) Lift out the metal gear. Try it on the shaft and see if it slips, probably does. 22) Take some needle nose pliers and burr the end of the shaft that goes into the metal gear. Doesn't take much. The shaft should be a very tight fit into the gear but it still has to slide all the way through. Use emery cloth to smooth out if you burr it too much. 23) Insert the shaft back through the odometer housing, mileage counters and potted gear and into hole on other side of housing. Make sure counters are lined up to original mileage before doing this. Try spinning red gear and make sure metal gear works. 24) (OPTIONAL). I put some 5 min epoxy on the ID of the gear before pushing the shaft through the gear. I wanted to make sure I did not have to see the inside of this abomination again (I did anyway as shown below). If you do this, make sure you engage the shaft all the way through the metal gear, clean the end of the shaft off with a Q-tip and clean off any other excess epoxy. Then push shaft into odometer housing. Let the epoxy cure and then check to see if everything moves like it is supposed to before reassembly. I did not wait and reassembled. After the epoxy dried, the metal gear was stuck to the housing and I had to tear it all apart again to unstick the gear. 25) Do reverse of above to reassemble. Speedometer needle should be put on the pin in the free position and then moved to other side of stop. The hardest part is getting the speedometer cable on. You may have to twist the cable some to get alignment while you try to push the cable on. Response from meyer@hpanis.an.hp.com: Your last step mentions the trouble of putting the speedometer cable back on. I've found a trick that helped a lot. All you really need to do is get the cable lined up with the instrument panel and just slide it onto the odometer. Then you open the hood and find the odometer cable entry into the firewall. You can now just push that cable through the firewall and it will snap into place. The first time I did this it seemed to be the hardest part of the whole job, but now that I figured out that trick it is a snap :-) ========================================================================== [HINT: if your odometer just dies one day out of the blue, try this fix] From: borowski@hpspkla.spk.hp.com (Don T. Borowski) Subject: Re: '85 Jetta odometer Date: 23 Sep 92 18:59:49 GMT >My '85 Jetta GLI's odometer seems to have died. >(Trip odometer is also dead, but the speedometer works fine.) >Can anyone save me tearing my dash apart, and tell me if this is repairable? >Do I have to replace the entire speedometer unit? This ought to be on the FAQ list. What has probably happened is that the gear which drives the 1/10 mile digit (and thus the whole odometer and the trip odometer as well) has split and thus no longer engages the shaft to the 1/10 mile digit wheel. You need to take the instrument cluster out, remove the speedometer, and repair the gear. I was able to glue the halfs back together and glue it back onto the shaft. I also twisted some fine wire around the flanges of the gear (near the shaft) and put glue over the wire and flanges also. Just make sure to get the gear back in the proper postion under the worm gear which drives it. Use a good grade of epoxy for the glue. [HINT: Another user has suggested checking for a suitable replacement gear at a hobby store. If available it most likely will be made out of brass and have a set screw to lock it onto the shaft. This seems like the best way to fix this gear, if you can find a replacement!] ___________________________________________________________________________ [HINT:use this fix for temperature related odometer failure] [Edited] From: gshaffer@frc.ri.cmu.edu (Gary Shaffer) Date: 25 Feb 93 22:33:36 GMT Reply-To: gshaffer@frc.ri.cmu.edu Sender: news@cs.cmu.edu (Usenet News System) References: <1993Feb24.194407.10896@news.cs.brandeis.edu> Organization: Field Robotics Center Article-I.D.: cs.C31002.EM.2 Nntp-Posting-Host: crop.frc.ri.cmu.edu NOTE: Additional notes add by Griff Miller . It was a different gear in my odometer. Similar problem. The gear on the other end of the shaft from the one that is driven by the worm gear was slipping on the shaft. (This is the gear just to the right of the "ones" digit.) It is supposed to stick to the shaft and drive the trip odometer, but there are six other gears on the shaft that are *supposed* to slip, so the shaft is greased. I had to completely dismantle my odometer. Here's what I remember: 0. Remove instrument cluster and open it up by removing 8 screws. 1. Remove screw which holds 3-pin voltage regulator in place. (This is on the blue flexible circuit board) 2. Remove L-shaped circuit board from around odometer. 3. Carefully pull Speedometer out of cluster 4. Hop needle over peg and see where it points. Remove needle by *carefully* pulling it off. There is a little white tick mark to the *right* of the stop peg. When you replace the needle, it should point at the tick mark. (Remember to hop the needle back over to the left of the peg when you are reassembling!!) [Griff: I would caution not to use a lot of force trying to get the needle off of the shaft. If it doesn't come off readily, you can try what worked for me; i.e. using a pair of needle-nose pliers to hold the ~1.25" disk to which the needle shaft is attached, *from the back*. This will hold the needle shaft still and you can gently twist the needle back and forth to work it off. Hopefully, if anyone needs to do this they will be able to - my speedometer has a hole in the back for some sort of electronic pickup (I guess for the MFA). Maybe not all have this.] 5. Pull the coil spring off the shaft. I expected it to go "SPROING" when I did this, but it didn't. Note how to put it back *before* you remove it, but it seems to have a natural position that it likes. (this step may not be necessary. [Mark]) [Griff: All you have to worry about here is not to put it back on upside down. If you can't remember which way it goes on, just remember that as the speedo needle shaft turns clockwise (as viewed from the driver's side of the speedo) this little spring should get smaller. And again, be gentle when you remove and reinstall this little piece.] 6. Remove the two small black screws that hold the face plate. 7. Remove screws holding rear plate to odometer assembly. 8. Remove offending gear, clean shaft, and apply minscule amount of Loctite. (That's what I did anyway.) 9. Reassemble. I've gotten to be pretty quick at this... It's not that hard -- I was just paranoid about destroying my speedo while trying to fix my odo. Happy ending though... Gary Shaffer Internet: gshaffer@frc.ri.cmu.edu Field Robotics Center Phone: (412) 268-6554 Carnegie Mellon University Fax: (412) 682-1793 Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890 __________________________________________________________________ From: WHERE@MAPLE.CIRCA.UFL.EDU [Mark Wendt] I did another variation on Gary's idea. Instead of using loctite, I peened the metal gear a little bit with a flat bladed screw driver and a small hammer. Peening the gear made the the hole diameter slightly smaller yet still allowed me to press the gear on and off the shaft. Getting all the number wheels lined up after peening the gear took a few tries, but it did the trick. Had I used loctite, I may not have been able to re-align the number wheels properly as the loctite set-up. (peening= hitting the side of the gear enough to leave a slight dent in it.) Another variation I have used was to knurl the shaft itself with a pair of needle nosed vise grips. Locking the shaft in the vise-grip pliers a few times chewed up the shaft enough that the gear was a very tight press fit. The disadvantage of this technique is that you have to be Very precise where you chew up the shaft, because all the other wheels on the shaft MUST spin freely on the shaft while the metal gear must be a tight fit. If you try this method, be very careful to knurl the right place on the shaft, and only knurl as wide as the metal gear, any wider and your odometer really won't work! When fitting everything back together after using this technique, I had to use a hammer to pound the shaft through the gear! But I haven't had any problems with the odometer since. :) Mark WENDTM@FIRNVX.FIRN.EDU '70 Beetle '80 Scirocco_S WHERE@MAPLE.CIRCA.UFL.EDU __________________________________________________________________ Message 1/127 from Scott Edlund Jan 19 '95 at 4:10 pm Return-Path: Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 16:10:13 -0800 (PST) Subject: Additions to VW Tech FAQ X-Sender: floater@case To: jan@UG.EDS.COM X-Envelope-To: JAN@FSHPP1 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT Got done with fixing my odometer a while ago, the FAQ walked me through it pretty well except one dumb mistake I made. I thought the speedo needle would just pull off. It did, but it broke off :( . So I had to buy a new speedo cluster ($70! expensive mistake!). So as to save someone else from making this mistake please tell them the needle doesnt pull off! (at least in my Scirocco 2). [Griff: See notes above about the locking the shaft and then gently twisting the needle on the shaft to work it off.] ===================================================================== Subject: Easy speedo cable removal/attachment Date: Thu, 3 Dec 1998 12:25:31 -0500 From: mkalan@parker.com To: jan@lipari.usc.edu JAN EXCELLENT PAGE, YOU MIGHT WANT TO ADD THIS TO YOUR HO-TO'S. THIS WILL SAVE PEOPLE A LOT OF TIME & AGGRAVATION! For anyone who has attempted to pull the gage cluster out of an A2 knows everything always goes smooth until it's time to remove or install the speedo cable on the gage cluster (over time I have ruined three cables). A few weeks ago I had to go through the process again (fourth time since I owned the car). It was not going smoothly and I wound up just yanked the gage cluster off the cable, ruining yet another cable. When is came time to put it back together and $30 for a new cable I couldn't get the cable back on the gage cluster. I started to look the car over and thought VW could not of designed the car that poorly that you could not get the speedo cable on and off the gage cluster. Then I figured it out! Removed the driver side vent next to the mirror. Once the vent was out you push the flexible air plumbing back and your have miles of room the stick your entire arm behind the gage cluster for easy access to the rear of the speedo cluster. To remove the vent all you need is a fillips screw driver. Look inside the vent on the top of the vent and you will see a fillips screw. Remove the screw and the vent pops right out. PS the Bently manual says nothing about this ============================================================================ Subject: hey, jan got a few more tips on the odo fix Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 22:16:52 -0400 From: Tim Goddard To: jan@lipari.usc.edu I fixed my odo today thanx to your webpage, i used two knifes to remove the needle by placing them on opposite sides of the barrel (worked great, i was worrying about breaking the damn thing but it popped right off), my car is an87 vw gti 16v, i noticed that my speedometer was still attached to the blue-flex-circuitboard, after disconnecting the things as advised. I had to use a detail flat-headed screwdriver to loosen a plug that came off the blue flex-circuit, that connects to the board inside (oil pressure you said?) i had to open it up while the blue was holding everything together, kinda unrolled it....had to be very careful... The gears that were bad on mine were the red, and the metal gears which are at opposite ends of the shaft. The red was easy enough, i scored the surfaces and used some krazy glue, tiny amount) and then the metal gear i also used the same,,, i tried peening it like that guy mentioned but unfortunately i wasn't able to force the gear back on the shaft while it was in the housing(plastic). i put glue on the inside of the metal gear, and put the gear on, now, i had the problem where the hundreds thousands placed whipped over like it was the tenths.. (b4 it broke, and b4 i bought it) i decided since the odo said 746,435 and it was a discrepancy on my registration i figured why not set it to the approximate 200k miles, heres my tip: when trying to keep the numbers lined up and in the correct position so they are not staggered one number being off half in position, i placed the first number in the correct position, used a strip of masking tape or any tape would work, and proceeded to the next wheel... and keep adding tape so that the wheels all stay aligned,, and it helped so much, advancing the shaft along with it...