Custom tach light??

I was wondering if its possible to make a tachlight from a led light such as the vtec indicator on jdmfan.com. Basically what I mean is just a led light that turns on when I reach a certain rpm. Then wouldnt I need some kind of controler to adjust when it comes on? Do they make such a thing, is any of this possible?

yea on most tachometers that you buy they have a lil circle light on the top which turns on when u hit the rpm u have set it to

yeah but I mean can I use my own light? I dont want another tach other than my stock one so I just want to hook a led light up to some controler that I can set o turn on at certain rpm's.

i have no idea, but id say try asking somone who has a tach with a light, and see if you can figure out how it works.

ok, what do you think of this? I can buy an MSD rpm activated switch with a module kit and just connect it to a LED. It seems as though this set up will work, what do you think?

sounds good to me

I believe (correct me if I'm wrong), but I think RPM on the stock OEM tach is controlled by voltage. If so can't a voltage controlled switch be used to light the led running off of a relay? I to wanted to do this, but the only thing I could come up with was using one of those adjustable shift lights (seperate from a new tach) and soldering leads into the light socket connecting it to an LED somewhere in my dash and hide the controller somewhere else.

ok, here it is. I'm ordering an rpm activated switch, cheap but effective, you could by msd's but they require modules(more money), with this one I can adjust the rpm without anything extra. I'll just soder the led on and connect the wires. I'll let you know how it works out with pics, maybe.

P.S. what wire would I splice for the tach and where?, I have a 98 civic

Man!, this is just not working! There's so many things that are possibly wrong.

First off, Im not sure with the tach wire, I connected to the back of the gauge cluster, but Ive read stuff saying you need to connect under the hood. For this you need to get through the firewall, but I dont see any grommets.

Second, the 12v wire I connected to the power socket which I think is good. But before this, just to test it out, I spliced it to my indiglo gauges which are connected to the parking lights. When I took the splice out, the gauges stopped lighting, Great!! Now Im screwed, did I short circuit them or something, did the splice cut the wire??

Third, the RPM activated switch I bought is made by VDO from "Racer Parts Wholesale", I dont know how good that is, it looks cheap, it may not even work! Is there any way to test this?

Lastly, I dont know if I'm paranoid now or what, but it seems like my passenger side power window is going up slower and noisier than usual. Theres no way I could have caused that is there?

If you can help with anything or have any idea PLEASE post. Thank you so much.

My indiglos are definitely not working, I checked all the connections. What should I do? There's a white plastic piece on the power wire of the indiglos. I can see through it a little and it looks like theres a spring with space between it. I connected the wire that would have shorted it before it. Theres also a black box where all the wires derive from. Does anyone have an idea on how to fix it. If not, would the company exchange me another one for the product? Its made by Toucan Industries. Somebody HELP

There's a white plastic piece on the power wire of the indiglos. I can see through it a little and it looks like theres a spring with space between it.

if im readin this right then im guessing that the connection has been broken, perhaps by short circuiting??? you will have to replace the indiglo as you can probably guess. if it is meant to be there then yes, the splice could have cut the wire (if you must then you could try resoldering the wire or replacing it). VDO are a good company and make a lot of gauges, so i would think the switch will work ok. i think you're window going slower is probably just paranoia!! unfoirtunately i cant really help you fix of what you have told me, is it possible that you could post some annotated photos of the assembly? that would make it easier for us all to help you.

yeah, ill get some pics up quickly.

This is the white thing,

Heres how I connect wires, by splicing, is this OK?

here..

heres the black box, maybe its broken inside

heres the black box, maybe its broken inside

Heres the rpm activated switch, which I guess is not made by vdo, but RPW. It came with a VDO set, but I bought it seprately at this place, racer parts wholesale (http://www.racerpartswholesale.com/sftlight.htm) Heres what it looks like, cheap?

The white thing: i cant really see where you mean by the broken connection, but you will be able to see if there is any way a current can pass through it. if there is no way a current can pass through the wires/electrical connection then that is probably you're problem.

Splicing: That should be fine to connect the wires. One thing i always do when connecting bare wires is to solder them to make sure they are well connected, but what you have done should be ok.

Black box: If you think you may have short circuited then this box could have been damaged, but if thats not the case and you havent messed with its wires then i see no reason why that well be the cause of you're problem.

ooops, nearly forgot the rpm switch: as i said before VDO are a decent enough brand, so i dont see any reason why that is the cause of the problem providing it has been connected up properly.

first of all, thank you Pennzoil GT-R for being so quick and helpful to me.

-I guess I did cut the wire because I spliced it, I am reconnected now and the gauges are working, so Thats done, I dont have to worry about that. (Forget about the white thing and the black box)

-Now the rpm switch. I called a local mechanic and he told me that I cant hook the tach up to the wire behind the gauge cluster because its different voltage. He said to run it to the to the distributer which was already suggested to me. I cant seem to get through the firewall with the coathanger(also suggested) even though I took off a grommet. It seems like its hitting something. I guesss I'll go down to him later so he can take a look at it.

-One last thing, the rpm switch IS NOT made by VDO, I messed up earlier, its made by RPW and I think its exclusive to the company that I bought it from. You can check it out at the link I posted earlier.

I have an '00 Civic DX, but all the wiring is the exact same, as both your '98 and my '00 being 6th gen Civics. I have an Autometer tach in my xcar, and have the green RPM wire hooked to the tach/RPM blue wire on the back of my guage cluster, and it works perfectly fine there. And their IS places you can poke a wire through in the firewall, I know because I poked the 8 guage wire to my amp through it, no drilling, no problems. ;) Just check around, run the wire through where existing wires go through the firewall if need be.

i think the easiest spot to go through on the firewall is the where the a/c tube is down on the passenger side, its where i ran the wires for my alarm through.

Its not working, I fed it through and hooked to the tach but still nothing. Maybe its my power wire, I attached it to the back of my accesory socket where there was a yellow wire and a black wire, I hooked it to the yellow, is this ok? Does power go down there?

Use a test light to find out. Get a lightbulb and two wires touch it to the leads and see if it lights.

Ok I used the test light and it worked. That leaves me with the shift light. I have the wire from the switch to the one side and the other side of the Led is attached to a ground, does this sound ok?

I also just realized the rpm switch tells me the light cant exceed 1 amp. Is a LED over the 1 amp limit?

I finally got the instructions faxed over that didnt come with the switch. There is something suprising me, I had one wire going to the LED and the second wire of the LED going to a ground. What they show is the second wire going to a +12v wire between the tach wire and the fuse box. Where is this wire?, it must be the final thing to correct.

Maybe your ignition wire? Try tapping it into a thick black wire with a yellow stripe on it, that's your main ignition wire.

silver, go here other thread (http://www.automotiveforums.com/vbulletin/t57143.html) I got a picture of the instructions up, see what you think.