Need Resources

[RustCollector]

Every time I have attempted to bring my '88 Suburban back from the dead over the 5 years since I parked it I run into the age old no-time-no-money curse. Well I finally have a hedge for both and by darn this monkey is getting back on the road!

First order of business is to make it run... which requires starting it... which for reasons I don't want to get into requires putting my dash back together .

I need two things to accomplish that, which I am hoping ya'll can help with.

First, I need good schematics. Know where I can find them? I have the ones in the Haynes manual, but I found them incomplete and inaccurate. It's a real mess in there....

Second, I want/semi-need a custom instrument bezel. The aftermarket ones I can find are not quite what I need, which for that price they better be. So I think making one from scratch is the way to go. But to do it right I need to reverse engineer the factory bezel, which has proven extremely challenging. I have a hedge for time, but not THAT much time, LOL.

Anyone know of a source of mechanical drawings, CAD models, or similarly accurate resource to short-cut the effort? For either the bezel or dash/pad?

 

[AKguy]

Start here from this forum for wiring:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/jcnww...t_Truck_Wiring_Manual_Complete_11x17.pdf/file

Contact these folks to see if they have a color schematic for your rig:

https://colorwiringdiagrams.com/

 

[RustCollector]

Start here from this forum for wiring:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/jcnww...t_Truck_Wiring_Manual_Complete_11x17.pdf/file

Contact these folks to see if they have a color schematic for your rig:

https://colorwiringdiagrams.com/

Holy cow I forgot the stupid email notification thing when I watched this thread. Here I thought I was left out to dry and everything I needed had been provided within minutes, LOL.

Thank you kind sir!

 

[AKguy]

My pleasure.

 

[Raider L]

@RustCollector,

You can find all you need right on our "Library". Now, as far as bezels are concerned, what happened to yours? Are you talking about the outside part, right? Again, what happened to yours? Is it busted? Don't try and make one, it's a pain. I know, I did that. I was going to be cool and make myself one out of .050" alum. sheet. That bexel is not shaped like you think it is. And unless you know someone in the GM archives who can sneak the original plans out and or make copies out of them you'll not be able to just "find" the measurements for the bezel.
Head to the wrecking yard and get one there.
Heck, contact @AuroraGirl and see if she has one she'd sell you. Or any of these guys on here are bound to have one. And yeah, the after market people want an arm and a leg for one. Ridiculous prices.

 

[RustCollector]

@Raider L , the bezel was in typical 30+ year condition, but it's not even that

Years ago my cluster needed a lot of work. So I yanked it out and bought a set of Autometer MCX gauges... a tach/speedo combo and a quad in 5". They were roughly the same size as the factory large gauges, so it made sense. But they didn't fit in the factory holes. So i rigged up a funky bracket to hold them against the back of the holes like the factory unit. It was janky to say the least, but from the outside it looked good.

So I always wanted to fix that. I also hated the real estate going to waste where the 4 smaller factory gauges sat. Then there's the AC controls, which are garbage, the sloppy nasty AC vents, and I never enjoyed the situps to get to the radio

Last but not least, I have had to remove that bezel more times than I can count and it is the most painful, fiddly, irritating process on the truck!

So my goal was to use the factory bezel as simply a frame... cut everything out of the middle. Then in the new holes left behind I wanted to do 5 inserts/panels... one for the gauge panel, one on the left panel to mount some storage pockets, one on the right panel to mount the stereo and aftermarket AC controls, then one to replace the headlight switch panel to mount a better vent, then the last one to replace the factory stereo panel to give a home for the vent I moved off the upper right panel and a spot for a USB/power port.

Makes the bezel modular, easy to service, and far more "modern" and functional than the factory design.

That bit you mentioned about the bezel not being the shape it appears is why I've had a heck of time reverse engineering it. It's a far more organic shape than it appears.

For what it's worth though, I persevered and I think I got it close enough. I have all 5 panels 3D printed in PETG, coated in epoxy resin, and waiting for the cut up bezel to go into. There will be some clean up work to finish it off, but so far it looks like I may just pull it off...

Stay tuned

 

[Raider L]

@RustCollector,

Pic's, pic's, pic's! Yeah, I want to see it.
I order to get the 2 5/8" Autometer Sport Comp gauges in those four holes on the left I measured the gauge body and then looked to see how much of the original hole I needed to cut away. You can't get a saw in there so what came to my mind was to get a "rasp" saw that went in my sabar saw and literally melt the plastic away as the saw went around the hole. It worked great. And with my Dremel tool sanding drum smoothed everything out and the gauge went right in the hole. I had to use care though to put the back brackets on the plastic bezel because I was afraid it would crack it if I got it to tight.
I then measured those center big holes and they turned out to be just a tad bigger than the body of the 3 1/2" Sport Comp "in dash" gauges but i just painted the plastic around the holes Black to kinda hide the gauge going in and repainted the "ring part outside the hoile as it is, Silver to kinda match the Sport Compo gauge ring on it's outside matched up pretty good.
But, yeah, you have to do some modifying to get the after market gauges in. But I would still like to see what you did. You know we're into pictures on this forum. We get ideas from other people's work.