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919 Custom Gauge Faces

4K views 18 replies 9 participants last post by  Ultra54 
#1 · (Edited)
I posted something about this on one of the 919 facebook groups, but I feel like I should post it here too for posterity. I just picked up a 919 earlier this summer. I've been enjoying it with the exception of a few small annoyances, one being the speedometer. The stock speedo reads about 10% too fast, which you can tell if you put your face right up against the cluster and squint really hard. It's better than nothing, but not great.

I decided instead of installing a speedo healer that would throw off the odometer, I'd kill two birds with one stone by designing gauge faces with a speedometer arc that's scaled back along with an easier to read layout. Removing the OE faces wasn't difficult, and scanning them into the computer at 600 dpi gave me plenty of resolution to work with.




I'm still not sure how I'm going to have them made. I already stripped the face off the speedometer plate and I wanted to go riding last weekend, so printed a quick mock-up to make sure the overlay fit and the numbers were placed correctly.



I'm going to need a more opaque black layer for the finished product, but the light diffusion across the white parts looked ok. I verified by GPS that it reads about 2 mph fast across the board, which is a big improvement in accuracy at 70+ mph. I'm thinking maybe I'll try a vinyl overlay for the black part or maybe reverse printing on transparency sheets.
 
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#14 · (Edited)
Finally got around to this, here is how the installation went with a few notes. Ordered from Venoxy, a Polish company. Not there is anything wrong with that, but they had a question about my home address that went to junk for 3 weeks before I noticed and responded. Obviously the OEM are a little more solid than the aftermarket and look nicer but these are nice and something different and currently bubble -free..

1. This is why I changed them, bubbles bugging me. Read on a ZRX 1200 blog that on another bike the bubbles were due to heat from the bulbs, not the case with the 919- the bulbs are at the top of the gauges. Went ahead and bought some new cooler temp LED bulbs anyway.

2. A big concern based on other threads was losing the zero on the tach. Noticed where the needle rested when pushed up/ around, took a few pics and thought I will just try to align them the same way when re installing.

3. Luckily I was able to reuse the needle stops from the original gauges. I say luckily because I had not given the existence of these things any thought before today. They pop out from the back side when squeezed with some small pliers. I had to expand the holes slightly on tach/heat face because the holes were a little small- did this with one of the gauge mounting screws.. bonus- did not have to remove the temp needle, able to slide the gauge. underneath

4. Once installed plugged into the bike and noticed that the sweep wasn't as synchronized. Also that the tach was not moving and hung at 2500 on cold bike. Took back to desk and removed the needle, removed and repositioned the needle about 3 times before getting it right. The needle will push into the assembly farther than it should. It needs to be pulled up about one detent/click before it moves freely. Don't be afraid to lift up on it to find the sweet spot that enables it to swing back to the stop or the resting spot on the other side.

5. Wasn't as big a deal as I imagined, was fun getting it right.
 

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#15 ·
Finally got around to this, here is how the installation went with a few notes. Ordered from Venoxy, a Polish company. Not there is anything wrong with that, but they had a question about my home address that went to junk for 3 weeks before I noticed and responded. Obviously the OEM are a little more solid than the aftermarket and look nicer but these are nice and something different and currently bubble -free..

1. This is why I changed them, bubbles bugging me. Read on a ZRX 1200 blog that on another bike the bubbles were due to heat from the bulbs, not the case with the 919- the bulbs are at the top of the gauges. Went ahead and bought some new cooler temp LED bulbs anyway.

2. A big concern based on other threads was losing the zero on the tach. Noticed where the needle rested when pushed up/ around, took a few pics and thought I will just try to align them the same way when re installing.

3. Luckily I was able to reuse the needle stops from the original gauges. I say luckily because I had not given the existence of these things any thought before today. They pop out from the back side when squeezed with some small pliers. I had to expand the holes slightly on tach/heat face because the holes were a little small- did this with one of the gauge mounting screws.. bonus- did not have to remove the temp needle, able to slide the gauge. underneath

4. Once installed plugged into the bike and noticed that the sweep wasn't as synchronized. Also that the tach was not moving and hung at 2500 on cold bike. Took back to desk and removed the needle, removed and repositioned the needle about 3 times before getting it right. The needle will push into the assembly farther than it should. It needs to be pulled up about one detent/click before it moves freely. Don't be afraid to lift up on it to find the sweet spot that enables it to swing back to the stop or the resting spot on the other side.

5. Wasn't as big a deal as I imagined, was fun getting it right.
Looking for some help with this gauge face swap. I just put these same gauges on my 2005 Honda 919. I thought that by putting the needles in the same "0" location was correct, but once I turned the bike on for the first time, the sync sweep was off and the RPMs seem way off. I tried taking it apart and re-aligning the needles farther below "0" and then pushing them up to rest on the needle stops. This helped, but it still feels like the RPM gauge is off. I can check the speedometer with a GPS, but I have no idea how to correct the RPM needle to be accurate.

Does anyone have any advice on how to set the RPM needle correctly. I believe my bike was idling correctly at 1200 RPM so maybe I should let the bike warm up and then set the RPM needle to 1200 RPM? Are there any diagnostic tools that I can acquire to plug into the bike to read the true RPM so that I can accurately set the needle?

*EDIT - I also removed the temp needle before pulling the old gauges off and now that is reading very low too. I'm not sure how to set that either. Maybe let the bike come up to to temp and put the needle in the middle?
 
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