Second Dash Test Fitting - POWER!

Yesterday seeing how I now had all of the electronics installed into my Knight Rider 2 TV Dash I figured it was definitely time for another test fitting in the Trans Am. This time would be a powered test since I know for sure now that my dash gauge cluster wires are wired correctly to the plug. I was pretty sure they were as I had done it very carefully and spent a lot of time making sure that I had labeled each wire carefully. But even still, being new to all of this I had my minor doubts. Here you can see my dash resting upside down on the back of my car (left), in preparation to be test fitted into the car. For this test I would simply be getting my dash into as close a position as possible to see what sort of tweaks and adjustments I would need to do and I would only be hooking up the gauge cluster plug and my plug I had most recently made for my GPS and LCD screens.

Here you can see my dash test fitted into the car (above left & right). Tough to get it in and I can even feel that it will need to be shimmed up and adjusted in some ways. I had a very difficult time getting my Quick Release steering wheel adapter on so some tweaks will need to be done there. Also it was very difficult to get the key into the ignition to turn on the car so some adjusting will need to be done there too. I think I may need to adjust my steering column a little to one side to get it to align better with the top middle part of the Switch Pods.

Here you can see my dash turned on (left). I did notice that the power seemed to have an intermittent connection in my dash gauge cluster plug so I think during all of my out of the car test in my back room the plug connection must have gotten damaged a little. Those pins in the Molex connectors can be pretty delicate and I think when I had two just inserted in for power and ground and held in place with an Alligator clip that somehow the female end of the pin must have gotten inadvertently widened. So I'll need to either re-pin it or just snip the power and two ground connections from my gauge cluster plug and wire them up to a different plug. Most likely one of those more sturdier trailer hitch plugs as the pins in those are factory sealed and very durable. I have to admit if I could have found one of those that was a 10 or 20 pin connector I would have used a couple of those for my dash gauge cluster connections. Oh well, live and learn ;)

I thought also during my dash powered test fitting that one of my "Dummy" rows of LEDs were not working but after reviewing some of my very early dash start up tests I could see that the board always acts that way so I guess that's just the way that one board works.

Over all I was very happy with my latest test fitting even though I can see I have a good deal of adjusting to do to get the dash to fit just right. Being new to this hobby I'm not sure how a lot of the other Knight Rider car builders tackle these many issues so I'll be doing some research on that to see if I can get some helpful pointers and tips that I will pass on here.

Installing And Wiring My Space Matt Buttons

"Buttons, Wires and Connectors, Oh My!"

Well I installed my make shift Space Matt buttons a little differently that I wanted too. I was going to cut out my rectangular hole a little bigger so as to sink the Space Matt buttons array into the hole so it would sit flush, but I'm a little hesitant to do that because the hole is cut to the size of the USB Space Matt Keyboard buttons that you can get from Knight Rider World, and like I say these may just be temporary buttons for me to use until I get around to ordering the USB buttons. Of course me doing it this way means that my plastic overlay I made is a little too thick for how I have the Space Matt buttons placed into the console as in they sit a little deeper down. I may make a thinner overlay out of some metal stock I have kicking around, I'll see what ends up looking good.

I had drilled in a large enough hole into the top of the fibreglass console to be able to thread in my wires for all of the buttons. I had to add a little more length to the wires so I would have a little more room to put in my Molex Connectors. I had to get a couple of 15 Pin Connectors as the electronics place did not have anything bigger. That's OK though, it just means having another connector sticking out of the wire loom ;) Each one will be clearly marked so they can't get confused so no biggie.

I have the one wire that connects all of the buttons together on the far side of the Molex Connector and then the 4 rows of individual wires for each button connection using up the remaining pins of the connector. This way I can organize them on the connectors in rows from top to bottom. Here in this picture on the left you can see I have started putting together the wires into the connector, I have the main buttons feed wire in place and the first top row of buttons wires in place, now to complete the connectors by following the same format. ;)

The Zip-Ties Worked

As I pretty much thought the Zip-ties worked perfectly along with the 4 aluminum tabs I made to secure that small piece of electronics board into place that holds the indicator LED and microphone for the Annunciator sound board. One of the tabs was also good for securing the wire bundle that has the Molex Connector attached for the wires that go out to the switch part of the relays board for the Switch Pod Buttons.

Aluminum Tabs Added To The S-1 Upper Console

I was trying over the last few days to figure out a good way to mount that small electronics board I made up that has the LED indicator light and Microphone on it that I relocated from the Annunciator sound board in order to make it install better into my S-1 Upper Console. I had originally thought of making up 2 or 4 "]" shaped brackets and bolt the board to the top of the bracket with small bolts. But I figured it's not all that big and it basically just need to be mounted in such a way that it's not going to move about all over the place so I came up with the very simple solution of making 4 small "L" shaped tabs with a hole in one end that a "Zip-tie" could be thread through and then through the hole in the corner of the circuit board, one "Zip-tie" for each corner hole. Just waiting for the fibreglass resin and matting to set but I'm pretty sure this will do a nice job of securing the small piece of board into position and still make it easy to take out at any future time that it should ever need maintenance.

On a separate note for todays accomplishments I got the rest of the switch power wires on my left hand Switch Pod connected to the Molex Connector that way they are not just flying around loose. I can attach wires to the other side of the Connector when I have a purpose for those other buttons. I'll need to pick up another 12 Pin Molex Connector for the right hand Switch Pod power wires, perhaps I'll do that this week just to get that little job out of the way and then those wires will have a connector and be well prepared for future use.