I have an old 86 Toyota truck that has no tach.  I kinda like it that way.  I grew up on old VW's and we learned to shift based on feel of pants and sound.   I kinda also like the bigger fuel and temperature gauges.

Am I the only only one?

Is it easy to swap out clusters and put the tach in?

Is it easy to put a clock in one that doesnt have it to begin with?

Talking pre 88.5 here..

Thanks much

Peter

I like a tach.  I like data and lots of it.  I'm a little twitchy because I don't have an OBD port for my Scangauge.  After adding the tach, I saw I could wind the engine up far more than I was without pushing it too hard.

I bought an instrument cluster with tach from trail tough for $129.  Look in the used parts section.  There are some on ebay but they usually list for $200.  Plug-n-play installation and now I have a tach.  Remove 4 bolts with an allen wrench.  Three wires, red white and blue, need to be disconnected under the dash.  The connectors pop apart with no tools or splicing/crimping needed, tho you may need to gently pull them apart with pliers since the rubber's had 25 years to stick.  There are two harnesses and the speedo cable to disconnect on the back.  There's just enough slack to disconnect these from the front.  Reverse the process to install the new one.  (Remove the left two screws on the dash so you can lift it enough to clear the hazard light switch.)

BTW, the tach cluster has a plastic lens which will probably be pretty scratched up but a treatment or two with a headlight restorer kit will polish it up nice.  I also put in LEDs while I had it apart.

FWIW, I prefer the layout of the status lights on the non-tach cluster.  The turn signal lights are up high and much more visible.  Having all the lights lined up across the bottom causes them to be obscured pretty often by the arms of the wheel.  But I'm still glad I switched.  To me, the tach more than compensates for the relocated status lights.

Don't know about the clock.  It looks like I'd need to get a big hole saw.  The spot where it would go in my '87 doesn't have a pop/punch out.  I used that spot to stick a phone mount.

Like you, the cars of my youth did not have a tach - one of them (a classic Mini from the factory had only a speedometer & a fuel gauge), and I learned to shift "seat of the pants" - but just about everything else in the last two decades has had one, and yes I do use it - I still don't shift by the tach, but if you know what you're looking at, there's a lot of information that can be gleaned from it.

My Mitsubishi has an AW4 automatic transmission, so you might feel the tach is useless (I've heard people make that statement about automatics with tachs) - about a month ago, I had one of the sensors in the tranny fail, it would not shift into top gear and the TCC woiuld not lockup - I noticed it because the tach was reading higher than it should for the speed I was driving at - and long before the CEL came on.  Without the tach I would have been wasting fuel in third and possibly overheating the transmission, and not known about it until it bit me in the wallet.

Even driving a rental I find I can get a pretty good idea of fuel economy by comparing the tach and the speedo and adjusting my driving style accordingly.

Like jtown, I like data - everything I own gets additional instrumentation - oil pressure, voltmeter, and the Mitsu is about to get transmission temp and a "shift indicator" that'll show which gear has actually been selected.

My first vehicle did not have a speedo, but only a tach. Fuel gauge was a clear glass tube float style......True old school!!!!!!!!!!!!


BUT these days with engines that have integral ECU controlled rev limiters(that are very dependable), there is no need for a integral dash tach.

It is a proven scientific fact that the majority of drivers are dangerously distracted by excessive displays and instumentation, not too mention tech distractions like mileage, GPS, and texting/cell calls. Multi-tasking has no place in the drivers seat!!!

BUT these days with engines that have integral ECU controlled rev limiters(that are very dependable), there is no need for a integral dash tach.

Only if you're depending on the tach to avoid over revving the engine - many of today's engines run "out of breath" long before they redline or the limiter kicks in.

It is a proven scientific fact that the majority of drivers are dangerously distracted by excessive displays and instumentation, not too mention tech distractions like mileage, GPS, and texting/cell calls. Multi-tasking has no place in the drivers seat!!!

You'll get no arguement from me there - I don't particularly care for the "information center" in the wife's new 2012 Lancer, takes me too long to figure out what it's telling me - the damn thing changes on the fly forcing you to actually read it to know what it says - mind you - if there's a problem, you can tell just from the color.

In contrast my vehicles have analogue gauges - I can see the angle of the needles at a glance and tell if one is "out of position" and warrants a second glance.  The actual reading is not as important - unless the needle is "out of position".  As an example, the tranny problem I mentioned earlier - I can tell which gear the tranny is in by the angle of the tach needle relative to the speedo needle - if they are at roughly the same angle, it'll be 3rd, which is fine, except when it should in OD.

It is a proven scientific fact that the majority of drivers are dangerously distracted by excessive displays and instumentation, not too mention tech distractions like mileage, GPS, and texting/cell calls. Multi-tasking has no place in the drivers seat!!!

And some people denounce cell phones because they're "intrusive".  A cell phone is only as intrusive as the user allows it to be.  They can be ignored.  They can be turned off.  Nobody's forcing drivers to stare at every gauge and display in their range of vision to the exclusion of everything else while speeding through a school zone.

These devices when used properly reduce distraction.  My GPS gives me audible prompts to "turn left in a quarter mile" "turn left in 500 feet" "turn left now" so I don't have to take my eyes off the road to try to find a street sign.  Having a temperature gauge lets me see the engine temperature rising before it becomes a critical problem.  That provides time to choose a safe place to pull over rather than have to pull over on the side of a busy interstate because steam is coming out of the hood.

I'm not going to lower myself to the lowest common denominator just because other people aren't able to prioritize.

Temp gauges are basic instrumentation and needed.
 
Personally I say every ECU should have a cell blocker that xmitts within the car when moving, and as for GPS, they are more than worthless for me, so many times the damn thing has ya turning onto non existant roads, and is forever saying recalculating, tossed it out of the truck long ago, I know every paved road, logging road, fire road and deer trail in my area, dont need the thing, LOL

And yes I have a cell phone, a prepaid trac-phone that spends it's life in the glovebox. I put the battery in when I need to make an emergency or long distance call, that is if you are in a area that has any reception, for safety ya have a CB for quicker response.