1955 Ford Ranch Wagon/ Digital gage Cluster

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poolplayer1

Senior Member
Do any of you have a Dakota Digital Gage Cluster installed in your 55 car or wagon? I found one for the 56 but not 55. My gas gage and Speedo do not measure correctly at all. On the gas gage, when it reads just under half a tank its actually empty. The speedo is off about 10 MPH. I have tried different sending units and even change the gage to a 12 volt since I converted the system to a 12 volt but still not right. If any of you have a digital one in your 55 car or wagon,please let me know how well it works and where to get one.
Thanks to all.
PS- Covid is still strong in my area. Most of my family have gotten it but glad we are all still here.
 
For the speedo, they sell different gears that go on the end of the cable. They have a different tooth count and will adjust the speedo up or down depending on the number of teeth. The only problem there is only a limited number of these with different tooth counts for a 55 or 56.. I know the TBird vendors sell them, don't know about the other vendors.
 
As far as water temperature, oil pressure and fuel level, I doubt you will be able to get the guages to read true values using the old sending units as they work under different operating principles.
1) Most of the repro parts suppliers are selling solid state fuel sending units but you should check first to make sure there are not other modifications (voltage, mounting flange, etc) that you don't want to deal with.
2) The '55 oil pressure idiot light is operated by mechanical contacts (located in sending unit). If the cluster you are using has an oil press guage, you may need to switch to a solid state unit if the guage is electronic. There are some modern mechanical guages that recieve a pressure signal through a small plastic tubing, but you need the sending unit for sending the mechanical pressure signal.
3) The '55 generator idiot light works off a contact in the OEM voltage regulator. This may not work depending upon what is supplied with the cluster.
For the speedometer (if it operated off a mechanical cable assembly), you can try to plug in your existing cable on the back of the cluster and see if the speed is accurate. Fomoco originally made speedo drive gears with 19 teeth, 20 teeth, 21 teeth and 22 teeth. The more teeth you have on your nylon speedo driven gear, the slower it will turn the cable and subsequently the slower the speedometer reading will be.
If the speedo guage is electronic, the OEM mechanical cable will be useless.
 
Thanks Dave for your great help. The cluster is still origional and so is the speedo cable. I am going to remove the speedo gear thats on the cable and connects to the ****** and see if the teeth are ok or worn out.The ****** is a C4 and has been completely rebuilt so I'm pretty sure the driven gear on the ****** end is ok. Since I had converted the electrical system to a 12v, I decided ( Its been awhile) to put in a fuel gage from a 12v 57 ranch wagon. Thats what I have in there now. On the sending unit,I have a universal type that I bought from Mac's Auto parts. They said it would work with eighter a 12 or 6 volt system. The fuel gage is still way off.
Have you or anyone here heard of a interface unit called Meter Match that you can wire between the sending unit and the fuel gage. I might take a look at that and do some research and see how it regulates the fuel signal between the sender and the gage.
 
If you have a C4 trans, then there is a lot of choices as far as number of teeth. The best source for a selection is ebay, where I got mine. Count the number of teeth on your present gear and go from there, using Daves55sedan comment above. The gears are pretty cheap last time I looked. Also look at the orientation of the teeth. They make gears that go both ways.
 
With the right gear, you should be able to get the speedo pretty close. Assuming the head unit is good. The 55 gauges (fuel and temp) are King Seeley units, working on a different operating principle than most. A search will turn up some info, might be another make, but they’re all similar. I’ve never heard of a mismatched sender/gauge arrangement that worked, but I have heard of a lot that didn’t. Changing the 55 gauge to a 57 probably didn’t help. The 57 was run on a 12 /6 volt reducer. 56 was the only set that actually ran on 12 volts. Not knowing better (and things were pretty faded) I replaced the 55 gauges and senders with 56 units in my 55 bird when I converted to 12 volts. Accuracy remains a problem.

Here’s a link to a discussion on this on another site, you need to read thru all of bergmanj’s comments on the “adjustable” procedure.

http://forums.y-blocksforever.com/Topic22135-1.aspx


I’ve helped install a couple Dakota Digital dashes. They used specific sending units (GM in these cases). They worked well and were fairly simple to calibrate. Bit too street rod for me.
 
Speedo gear:
One of the things you gotta watch out for is attempting to use original type speedo (including cable rotation) when changing to a different model transmission.
Example; you cannot install a '57/58/59 Fordomatic in a '55 and expect it to work. Using the '57 and later speedo cable and nylon gear (if it is even long enough to reach the instrument cluster), you will notice that the cable rotation is in the opposite direction from the OEM design. That is because the '57 and later Fordomatic rear extension housing has the nylon speedo gear running above the speedo drive gear. On older Fordomatics, the driven gear was under the drive gear. So now the rotation is backwards. There will be no indication at the speedometer.
Not sure about configuration of the C4, but it is something you will need to verify.
 
'57 wagon fuel guage in a 12-v converted '55 with solid-state sending unit:
Sorry, this will not work. Different operating principals.
Once you get a guage that is compatible with the sending unit, you will need to adjust the float to get an accurate reading at the guage.
When I did my '55 Courier wagon, I made a cardboard template including the drop-down area where the float sits when the tank is empty and used it as a guide for adjusting my float arm. There's ANOTHER hitch, though. If the *** end of your wagon is NOT perfectly level, there will be more fuel at one end of the tank than the opposite end. You need to anticipate this offset and adjust accordingly.
 
Thanks to all for your help. This information that you guys are giving me on my problem is very valuable to me. Very good advice, suggestions, and tips to go by. We have a very large salvage yard here in town that has hundreds of old cars. What if I go and try to find a sender from a 55 wagon and also the matching fuel gage from the same car. Since they would be 6 volt units, should I install a voltage reducer to drop the voltage from 12 to 6v?
I know they have 55 ford customline cars but don't know if they have the wagons. My gas tank is a 19 gallon tank and the cars are 17 gallon if I am not mistaken.
There would be a problem with the sender reading a correct fuel amount left in the tank.
I will go in the morning and see what they have. Thanks again.
 
poolplayer1 said:
... What if I go and try to find a sender from a 55 wagon and also the matching fuel gage from the same car. Since they would be 6 volt units, should I install a voltage reducer to drop the voltage from 12 to 6v?
...
Click to expand...
The original King-Seeley brand '55 gauges and sensors use bi-metal switching contacts and operate on heat, not variable resistance. In theory, the voltage doesn't make a difference since the heated contacts regulate themselves.
The fuel and temp gauges will work on 6 or 12 V and are not polarity sensitive.
Click to expand...
That said, in some circumstances a voltage reducing resistor will help.
More info at this link...

https://www.ctci.org/battery-for-6v-to-12v-conversion/
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Don't get a fuel sending unit out of any of the full-size sedans or hardtops. They have a deeper gas tank and the sending unit has a longer float arm than the wagons. It will never read completely full or completely empty. Only the wagon model sending units will work properly in a wagon tank.
 
Thanks guys for your help. I took the one gear out that attaches to the cable at the ****** end and one of the teeth was stripped out. It has 19 teeth on it. I went to phoenix on saturday and got a new gear. I installed the gear yesterday morning and than took it for a drive on a non busy road so that my wife could pull up next to me so we could match the speeds. We were both at 55 mph. Problem solved. Now, on to fixing the fuel gage and sender.
 
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