My stock amp gauge works, but SUCKS!

[Mr. Goodtool]

Hello group! here's my "situation" I have a C-20 1975 Chevy truck. The amp gauge is totally useless! The gauge BARELY moves at all. After removal, I tested the gauge and contacts (dash pin clips) and everything checks out as being good. I have searched the forum here, with some good info...case in point, "you will burn down the wiring harness, if you install a later year voltmeter in the amp gauges place" Ok, I got it. What to do next tho....Do I remove the pin clips in the circuit board, then wire up the later year voltmeter to the truck wiring elsewhere? is this the easiest method? Also, what year chevy truck voltmeters will retro fit my non-tach 1975 dash? To wire up the replacement voltmeter, I just need to find a 12 volt ignition-on power source, then ground the other side, and the voltmeter will work, I just need the year truck to look for. Thanks for any help in advance!

 

[bucket]

Keep in mind, I don't remember what the back of an ammeter cluster looks like, but here's my 2 cents.

I would remove the ammeter, trace the contacts on the printed circuit to see where they connect to the pins in the cluster connector. Then remove those pins from the connector (easy to do with a simple pick tool) and either tape them back out of harms way and covered, or just cut them off. You can then reuse those terminals and wire them to ground and IGN 12+. Then install a volt gauge in the cluster.

 

[bucket]

I went and took a look at the clusters I have. The ammeter and voltage gauges have their contact posts in different locations. The ammeter has two posts. The volts has three but only uses two of them. Of course, of the two it uses, one does not line up with the ammeter. I did not investigate what the third post would be used for.

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[bucket]

So unless the volt gauge has two posts that do the same thing, the easiest thing to do would be to hook a wire to the top post of the gauge and run it through the hole in the cluster and wire it into the truck separately from everything else. Or simply remove the contacts from your current cluster and leave the stock harness alone, then feed power and ground wires through the cluster and to the gauge.