how do i hook up a tach??

a recent thread posted by someone else reminded me that i wanted to hook a tac up. I drive an 83 caprice classic. Does the tac need to be calibrated at all? I dont have any specific kind of tach in mind yet but anything will help me have a general idea.

a tach needs a distributor signal and power.
the distributor signal comes from the "TACH" connection on the distributor, and the power can be spliced in from the rest of the gauges.
that should do it.

make sure to get a tach that is compatible with your engine...
there is a difference between a 8,6,4,10,12 or whatever number of cylinders your engine has.
most tach's can handle 6,8,and 4.

I was thinking of doing the same, even though the stupid little fuel economy vaccum guage acts like one, but i know its not the same. that thing is so useles, i'd rather put a real tach there so it can still look stock like it came with the car you know? but idk what kind of gauge would fit there.

Yeah, my parts wagon had one of those useless vacuum fuel economy guages. It was sticking so it would jump and stick there for a bit. My friend thought it was a gas guage at first and when he revved the engine the guage jumped down and stayed there and he was like "holy $hit, this thing is horrible on gas!" As some of you might have seen before, I put a tach in the place of my analog clock. It had a small potentiometer that came with it and you had to adjust it to eliminate the "jumps" that sometimes come from HEI distributors.

The clock would be a good place too, i took out my clock cause as usual it just stopped working, i just put a black peice of metal over where it was so now it looks like nothing was ever there. plus i got a clock on my stereo anyway

well my dash has a big empty spot where the fuel economy thing is supposed to be. i was thinking about putting a tach in, but then i realized that it would be about as pointless as putting a blower on a lawn mower...
my car is the definintion of a boat.
229 v6, th350, 2.73 rear end.
not much in the way of acceleration

A blower on a lawnmower... now that'd be interesting. Maybe even a little humorous. But anyway, I didn't put my tach in for performance reasons, I just like to see what my RPMs are, along with other engine stats. Thats why I also installed temperature, voltage, and oil pressure guages as well. I just don't like not knowing whats going on under the hood. For instance, when driving my truck now during the winter months, I'm constantly glancing at all the guages, seeing that everything is as it should. Call me crazy, I know. The tach also helped me to adjust the in-gear idle and the A/C idle kick-up solenoid to where it should be on my Caprice.

i understand what you are saying.
being able to know for sure what your rpms are is a good thing.
especially if you drive in "other than normal conditions" frequently.

in my case however, i weighed the benifits and costs (money) and it wasnt worth it.
my rpms are either way high, high or medium low.
thats the nature of the 3 speed trans i have.
in my next car, i will install a full set of gauges, but since i am trying to get rid of the caprice, there isnt much point.
which is why i said it was useless

Yeah its nice to know how fast the engine is running, but i'd use it for mainly if i had a sporty performance car, they are also helpful of course when driving a manual tranny

its odd tho.
most new cars with manuals have no tach, whereas nearly all with automatics do.
i am of course talking about mid-range cars.
your everyday driver...
not high performance cars

A blower on a lawnmower... now that'd be interesting. Maybe even a little humorous. But anyway, I didn't put my tach in for performance reasons, I just like to see what my RPMs are, along with other engine stats. Thats why I also installed temperature, voltage, and oil pressure guages as well. I just don't like not knowing whats going on under the hood. For instance, when driving my truck now during the winter months, I'm constantly glancing at all the guages, seeing that everything is as it should. Call me crazy, I know. The tach also helped me to adjust the in-gear idle and the A/C idle kick-up solenoid to where it should be on my Caprice.

Thats the exact same reason why i wanted one. I just like being able to see what the engine is doing.

a tach will have 3 or 4 wires coming off it depending on if it has a light or not

the red and white wires will go to a power sorce that turns off with the car so it dosnt drain your battery

the black will go to a well grounded point

the green will go to the distibutor and will plug into the cap next to the power wire on a hei