New Duster dash!!

[TheDuke]

Its the factory gauge bezel, it has to be cut and the aftermarket gauges fitted into it. It's a pretty labor intensive affair. That factory plastic makes some really memorable smells when you start grinding and cutting them.

FACTS!

Cutting the factory bezel out produces an interesting smell and smoke that I hope I won’t have to pay for later. It takes a brave soul to start hacking up your classic muscle car but in my case, my car is made up of a half dozen other cars and the entire cluster was dead save for the fuel gauge which o my read the first 6 gallons of gas.

 

[Garrett Ellison]

I know that feeling! Mine was original to the car but mostly a non functional affair too. I used quick set epoxy and had some no. 4 Allen bolts and screws I put in the perimeter edge. That really seemed like the only good way to stiffen up the plastic new vintage panel. I tried to order the other style with the aluminum plate and the four small gauges staggered on the left side but they were on a six month back order at that time.

 

[RedFish]

Looks nice but familiar too. Others have discovered that their gauge placement fills the area where factory harness connectors to headlight switch and wiper switch belong. I don't know if flip those switches 180 degrees might be a solution. One member was seeking extensions to move the OEM switches a few inches further behind the bezel. Others opt for different switches. Good luck with it.

 

[Garrett Ellison]

Yes, the wiper and headlight switches have a certain sweet spot the have to be rotated to, the wiper 60 degrees or so and the headlights close to 90. I also took a large piece of thick clear packaging plastic (the kind they heat seal up and hang items from pegs) and cut it two inches wide and epoxied lengths of it to the surround above the gauges after wiring them as a shield. I had this mental image of a wiper arm popping out and the clip flying into the open gauge wiring. If your using the coil to run the tach signal, I had to set my dip switch settings to 6cyl setting with the filter on to read off a Blaster2 properly. I retained all the other signaling leads in case I choose to change ignition type in the future, although it’s more stuff to have to tuck up in and tie out of the way.