I did a swap last night and after the swap the tach did not work. When you plug in the board, you can hear a slight grinding noise that is coming from the tach motor. When you turn the car on, the tach does not move. Occasionally, the tach will try to jump up, but it will never get more than like a 1/4" from it's starting point.

I looked at the board and nothing is disconnected or burnt. All parts are still in tact and the points that I did check with my multimeter worked fine. When I move the needle around, the same grinding noise is made as when the board is plugged in. Kind of sounds like the teeth in the motor are just clicking on something.

Anyone know what this could be? Is it possible that the motor just went out? Could the motor go out by a faulty LED on the LED points? (The reason I ask that is because I connected two LEDs to a single point to make a color changing needle - one white and a red with a resistor to equal the load in a parallel circuit... both LEDs light up fine).

Anyone know where I can find a new motor? Or would I have to buy a whole new board? Anyone know how hard it is to replace the motor? Looks simple enough, but there could be something that I just don't see.
Any responses would be greatly appreciated

 

hmm.. certain components that are really, really small on the board might have been tampered or accidentally been disconnected.

check the board again to see if there's anything missing. if you can, take a really good close-up picture of the area and post it up.

 

uh oh... LOL!!!

 

Sounds like from another thread you have it figured out. I may try to send out info on how I do these in the near future. I dont elevate any leds. I create new boards that are mounted solidly to the white bezel, on a separate circuit with thier own leds to light the needles. No chance of stuff moving around that way. If you still need help with it let me know.

 

No, the other thread was for the other guys problem. This is still a problem of mine. No points are touching and the solder is good.

I do think the motor is messed up. If I can, I will take a pic of it and post it.
Do you have any other ideas Dave?

 

Check for tiny globs of solder or wire that may have gotten into the motor assembly. Also check the little components around the tach to make sure you dont see pads with no parts on it. If you can get some good macro shots of the areas of the board and send them my way I can try to compare to the test cluster I have here at home.

The other person you were replying to was already scheduled to send his cluster my way since Paul didnt "take care of him" like he promises. At this point I wouldnt send it back his way either if I were him in worry it would just come back worse, or come back weeks later. Maybe our replies on that thread will get him back in business so he doesnt have to pay shipping to have me look at it, but if not I will be getting it soon. His was intermittent at first and now is completely broken I think, so bad wiring and soldering could be the cause.

 

There are no tiny globs on the board - the board looks perfect. I didn't check inside the motor though, so I will be checking that in a bit. When I do, I will also take pics and send them over.

To get the motor off, I just need to desolder the four points that hold it on correct? It should just come off the board then right? If not, how do I look inside the motor?

 

its sounds like something is in the motor preventing the needle from moving maybe take a can of compressed air and give the board and motor a good spray

 

did you make sure you didnt push the needle down too far? i have see this happen numerous times, and even did it on my first install. take your gauges apart, barely attach your needle and see if it moves. if you push down just a tiny bit too far it will nto move and it will make a noise.

 

Ok, so I took the motor off the board and had a look inside the motor. This is a pic of the motor insides...



At the top of the motor (or from the pic, the far left side), the wheel is connected to a magnet. The magnet is a small ring and the plastic wheel fits inside of this ring. On the bottom, there is another small plastic piece that kind of holds the wheel in place. So, if you were to look at this ring from a side view, it would be small plastic piece on bottom -> magnetic ring in the middle -> plastic wheel on top.

Well, the small plastic piece had come off, and when the ring was turning, it was creating a grinding noise. I corrected the problem and put the motor back on the board. Connected the board to the car and voila! The motor works.... well, it worked.

And it only worked one time. I put the board back together and it stopped working. So, now that I have taken the motor apart, and it's not working, I think I can safely bet that either a) the motor is surely messed up or b) the contacts to the motor are messed up. Either way, it still does not work.

Does anyone know where I can get just the motor? If so, that would be great. If not, does anyone know where I can get a new board for less than $200?

 

Well, the new board will have to be programmed by toyota and I am not sure if they will reprogram a used one cheaply. I only have one test cluster, so I hate to get rid of one of the motors on it. I would look on car-part.com for a cheap cluster and pull the motor off of it. If you find one, let me know and maybe we can work a deal. I would like to buy one of the motors and a couple of other pieces on it just to have some spares for other testing I am doing, so you could probably get out pretty cheaply that way. I may even buy the gauge faces as well from you depending on price.

This probably happens when pressing the needle back on the motor. If it gets pressed too far the first time, it may damage the motor so this type of thing happens.

I am leary that the short between the led leads causes the motor to fail since it is not on the same circuit, so if orangesuburbans comes back again this may be the cause since paul sent it back with the needle pressed on way too far the first time. Pulling the needle to check the wiring and putting it back on may have temporarilly fixed it.

Let me know what you want to do for a cluster and we can work some sort of deal. That way we can both have some spare motors around. I could even trade for some parts next time you need them.

 

Dave, thanks for all your help so far. You have always been really great to come to for help.
Garage (I don't know his name) PMed me and has an extra board that he is willing to sell. So I am going to pick that up. I can also use it for testing and extra parts. But I will keep looking for a cheap cluster set and keep you informed. So far, the cheapest I have found is $204 on myscionparts.com.

Thanks again, and if any more problems come of this, I will keep everyone informed.

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/05-06...spagenameZWDVW

why not buy that and just rob the motor you need? no need to reprogram a new board, just get a donar board...

 

Good ebay search orange! Actually, Garage is going to sell me a board for a really good price and I plan on robbing the motor :D. If it doesn't work though, I will need the entire board and that of course will require a reprogramming.

This would be good to buy for a replacment though.