re: Troublesome Spider gauges

["Giller,Bruce C." <bgiller@domain.elided>]

Paul, 
	All of your gauges on the instrument pod are electrically activated.
There are several wire connectors that you should check before doing
anything 'rash'.

	Under the instrument pod (remove the drivers side knee pads for better
access), you'll find three, multi-wire connectors going to the pod.  Two
are largish and one is much smaller.  Inspect them for corrosion, broken
contacts, etc.  The ground for the pod also goes thru these connectors
and we all know how important ground wires are....

	There is another connector inside the pod itself you should inspect. 
Once you have disconnected the three connectors, just remove the two
nuts from the hollow bolts on the underneath of the pod (follow the
wires up to the pod to find these bolts), and a screw of which I can't
remember it's location but is visible when looking up from underneath. 
The pod is then lifted from the dash.  

	The front section of the pod can be popped off (and I think that there
are some screws on the back side) to open the pod.  Now you can inspect
the inside connector, solder joints, and the printed circuit board for
obvious flaws.

	To get one of my instrument lights to work, I had to solder in a jumper
wire to make it work even though the circuit board looked to be in good
shape.  I also have found a bad solder joint when my tach stopped working.

	Bruce

	'73 GTV
	'86 Spider

> It's probably a thread that has been beaten to death, so forgive me if it's
> old news, but what's the consensus on the gauges in a late-1980's Spider?
> 
> My '87 currently has two functioning gauges.  The speedometer and the fuel
> gauge.  Everything else is nonfunctional.  The tach moves, but erroneously,
> and nothing else registers any life at all.  My local Alfa mechanic, who knows
> Alfas well, is telling me that it's just "the nature of the beast".  That if I
> spend time and money fixing them all and/or having them rebuilt, they are all
> just going to crap out again.  Probably sooner rather than later.  Overall,
> (helpful as he usually is) he doesn't seem even the slightest bit interested
> or confident about getting them sorted.
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