Who has installed the newer Defi single DIN triple gauge setup?

[m sprank]

Why do you need to monitor these things?  For troubleshooting???  You dont monitor every day for troubleshooting.  You monitor if/when there is an issue.  So, an oil pressure gauge can be temporarily installed (for less than $50) for troubleshooting if needed.  If your losing oil you should know it.  Check your dipstick periodically.  Fuel pressure gauge can be easily added for temp troubleshooting as well (less than $50).  You do not need to monitor oil temp, just dont be a fool.  If it is that cold outside chances are road conditions do not permit "flogging it".  There might not be snow, but you cant see ice. 

Boost gauges are the most distracting of all.  I have never ridden in a force inducted car with a boost gauge that the driver was not watching.  Why??? 

You wont be able to convince me and you wont be able to come up with an excuse that over rides common sense.  Saying drivers with gauges are better is ludicrous.  All devices except radios should be outlawed as studies have shown that your brain can listen to a the radio and drive, but you lose focus as soon as it becomes a conversation.  In some states aftermarket gauges are illegal for this exact reason - DISTRACTION.  There are enough distractions and distracted drivers already.  Gauges are no better than cell  phones, video screens, etc.   

There are BT devices that can be used to send the ecm data to a logging device that is stored safely and not being watched.  You can make your own "black box" rather cheaply is you need to be able to revisit the data. 

I admit that when I was in high school I though a bevy of gauges was cool too and my Professional Race Driver dad told me I was an idiot.  Dad was not always right, we rarely agree on anything these days.  But... he was right about gauges.  All I need is a speedo and a tach.  Race on a bike and you will learn. 

 

Every day is not a shake down.  Your car is either ready to drive or not. 

[KZJonny]

3 minutes ago, m sprank said:

Saying drivers with gauges are better is ludicrous

I said all of the people I know with gauges are better drivers than those who have their cell phone sticking up withing view while driving. 

The implication there, is that they are car people, and understand driving a little. The people I am thinking of do not have a COBB or BTSS unit within site + a dozen readout on it at all times. Indeed many have gauges installed in the upper cubby on the dash, which is generally closed during driving.

I owned motorcycles for years before I owned a car. Did plenty of stupid things on them that make me shudder to think about now. Only had a tach, speedo and my ears to tell me what was going on with the bike. I often wished I had more information available realtime than: an oil seal blowing while riding, puking your oil, and locking the engine. With my Norton, this wasn't an unreal thing, since there are soft exterior oil lines that run to an external oil filter. Pick up some road junk you don't know about or don't and you won't get much warning about oil pressure before your rear wheel locks up....

Trying to tune with a wideband meant installing a gauge, putting paint/tape marks on the throttle and trying to look at your hands to tell how much the throttle was opened relative to AFR while riding. Not at lot of fun. I'd have killed to have something as simple as a gauge in my line of site....

 

Happy to agree to disagree about the usefulness of gauges. I think a quick scan of gauges every few minutes, or hour while cruising isn't putting anyone in more danger than changing the station on the radio.

 

[Pleides]

30 minutes ago, m sprank said:

Why do you need to monitor these things?  For troubleshooting???  You dont monitor every day for troubleshooting.  You monitor if/when there is an issue.  So, an oil pressure gauge can be temporarily installed (for less than $50) for troubleshooting if needed.  If your losing oil you should know it.  Check your dipstick periodically.  Fuel pressure gauge can be easily added for temp troubleshooting as well (less than $50).  You do not need to monitor oil temp, just dont be a fool.  If it is that cold outside chances are road conditions do not permit "flogging it".  There might not be snow, but you cant see ice. 

Boost gauges are the most distracting of all.  I have never ridden in a force inducted car with a boost gauge that the driver was not watching.  Why??? 

You wont be able to convince me and you wont be able to come up with an excuse that over rides common sense.  Saying drivers with gauges are better is ludicrous.  All devices except radios should be outlawed as studies have shown that your brain can listen to a the radio and drive, but you lose focus as soon as it becomes a conversation.  In some states aftermarket gauges are illegal for this exact reason - DISTRACTION.  There are enough distractions and distracted drivers already.  Gauges are no better than cell  phones, video screens, etc.   

There are BT devices that can be used to send the ecm data to a logging device that is stored safely and not being watched.  You can make your own "black box" rather cheaply is you need to be able to revisit the data. 

I admit that when I was in high school I though a bevy of gauges was cool too and my Professional Race Driver dad told me I was an idiot.  Dad was not always right, we rarely agree on anything these days.  But... he was right about gauges.  All I need is a speedo and a tach.  Race on a bike and you will learn. 

 

Every day is not a shake down.  Your car is either ready to drive or not. 

This seems weirdly outrage-y to me. Should we start removing coolant and fuel gauges from cars because they're "distracting?" What about odometers? Are those distracting on cars since they update while the car is moving?

 

I agree that huge screens and stuff are distracting and that people should get off their phones but double-checking your speed on your way through a school zone takes your eyes off of the road for the same amount of time as checking your oil temperature. 

[m sprank]

Assuming "car people" are better drivers is ludicrous.  Assuming race car drivers are better "drivers" is ludicrous.  I know more than a few race car drivers that are extremely bad drivers on public roads. 

Locking up the rear tire on any of my bikes was never an issue.  I have laid down, flipped, wrecked em any way you can imagine and I have only needed to see the er ONCE afterwards.  That was an offroad racing accident and I did not need the er, it was an over reaction.  I needed an orthopedic surgeon. 

You dont tune on the street, even I became smart enough and bought a dyno to get off the street.  Test and tune days at local tracks can be had rather cheaply if you are that gung-ho.

Technically you dont have to take your eyes off the road to check a speedo, thats why they are located where they are. 

So, for all you naysayers... here are a few pix of a REAL Race Car during tuning on a Real Dyno and wow, no friggin gauges.  See the small leds above the Motec drivers display?  If those go on the driver shuts down the car. 

Edited March 8, 2023 by m sprank

[m sprank]

Race bike (my Buell XB12)

Bobber (Honda I built at the shop)

Gauges be damned, lol.

[KZJonny]

I think this has gone waaaay out of the scope of the OP's question about fitment, and is getting a little bit obdurate.

Shall we start another thread to continue the arguement (discussion?), or maybe take it up in person at the Legacy ECM?

Provided in either case that someone can disagree and not be raged at?

 

 

[m sprank]

I did say, its your money spend it as you choose.  Call it Devils Advocate for those who might want to spend their hard earned cash on something other than dash bling.  

 

[shralp]

2 hours ago, Pleides said:

It's something that is a potential theft magnet being stuck on the dash or wherever and the coolant temp isn't super important to me as the dummy gauge does a good enough job of letting me know when things are working as intended. I leave the AP in the armrest. If it did oil temp I might consider it but the hardware isn't there for the AP to read.

Yup I can see your point for daily driver use.  I don't even have my AP plugged in in the Outback, its just sitting in the rear storage caddy in case I need to take it out to see if something has changed or to  trouble shoot.  The track car rarely, if ever, is left unattended in a public place so its easy to run the AP full time.  

I do like having real time water temp, particularly on hotter days because I know where the car likes to run.  It was nice to see real time data when I ducted in the gaps around my Koyorad that were created when I pulled the AC condenser from the car.  So much air was bleeding around the radiator that it needed a block off.  I was able to see a nearly 8 degree drop in water temps on my AP just by adding those. Never would've known that from the OEM gauge.  I also kinda like having the gear position window selected as well.  There have been a few times when I'm learning a new corner or trying a new race line option that its nice to confirm what gear I'm in.   

Edited March 8, 2023 by shralp

[VespaGTS]

1 hour ago, KZJonny said:

I think this has gone waaaay out of the scope of the OP's question about fitment, and is getting a little bit obdurate.

Shall we start another thread to continue the arguement (discussion?), or maybe take it up in person at the Legacy ECM?

Provided in either case that someone can disagree and not be raged at?

 

 

Ha! Yeah it went off the rails a bit.
 

I’m not a freak about monitoring gauges. Are they dash bling, yes. 
In the end it’s not a race car, I like the look of them and my car is super clean. So for me it was a bit dress up with some good quality functioning gauges that showed me the correct values to keep an eye on. 

[Febreze Mee]

11 hours ago, m sprank said:

Why do you need this?  If you spend your driving time looking at gauges, AP's,  phones. etc. you are obviously NOT PAYING ATTENTION TO THE ROAD.  Do you think race cars have all these gauges?  LOL. 

You have a coolant temp gauge on the cluster.  You have an oil pressure light on the cluster.  If your coolant temp is up, your oil temp is up too. 

This is all "Fast and the Furious" BULL SHIT that no car needs.  It is also dangerous to the general public if you are looking at gauges driving instead of the road.  A REAL race car does not have gauges.  They have dummy lights.  Dummy light comes on, shut it down.  Data logger tells what happened later. 

 

My two cents.  Its your money, spend it as you wish. 

Oh, I def don't need this. I want it! Same reason I have power folding mirrors and a Madrig wing. My car is no racecar, and I would not like for it to be —so I'm not concerned with what racecars do. 
 

It's also my understanding that by the time the oil light comes on, it's too late. As others have mentioned, I would like to see metrics in real-time using the exact gauge that I ordered, especially when flogging on the car.

[Febreze Mee]

Wow lol. I just finished reading the second pages. I replied too soon. 
I'm not sure who mentioned race cars first, but it certainly wasn't me. Not sure why it keeps coming up. My previous post addresses the "racecars" comments enough.

If we're being that petty about the safety aspects of the single din gauges, I hope if that FRS racecar is ever on the streets (it shouldn't be if it's a racecar —sAfTeY fiRsT), the driver where's a helmet and HANS device to mitigate any head and neck injuries as best they can. @Pleidestook the words straight from my mouth about the odometer. 
 

I did ask for comments, questions, concerns. All grievances have been heard and considered. Do understand that I did comb through decades worth of gauge threads and have read most of these things, so no one is saying anything original here.

I will enjoy the gauges by myself then Bling-bling!

Edited March 9, 2023 by Febreze Mee
I don't know how to proof read

[KZJonny]

Honestly, I think those defi gauges look pretty sweet. I just don't have that kind of cash, and I still like my OEM headunit just fine, so I wouldn't have anywhere to put them anyway.

Didn't mean to start a cockfight. I just do think that some realtime data has value, and that gauges are a good way of tracking it. I'll be installing a coupld in the Datto as well, since there are different concerns in 50 year old cars that can't be monitored with and AP or the like.

I respect @m sprank 's experience in all this. I'm sure he's forgotten more than I'll know about Subarus.

I'll thank my unfortunate g/f for teaching me the lesson that (despite my incredibly recalcitrant nature) some arguements aren't worth having. 

[m sprank]

How do you track data with a defi gauge.  You watch it.  So you are not watching the street.  When flogging it.  You are all admitting to gross negligence.  I cant stop shaking my head.

 

No that frs never saw the street.  Not in our hands. Purchased with a salvaged title ( as most new cars turned into race cars are). Never registered PURE race car.  You can see the fire suppression system in the cockpit pic.  Of course a helmet and hans were used.  Car was inspected pre-race in tech by officials every time.  I show it because there is a mindset that race cars have gauges and they do not. Its all Fast and Furious marketing BS.  We used hidden gauges with tattle tales pre-data logging.  Driver did not see the gauges.  Gauges in my dads 510 race cars were under the dash. No way to see them. 

Oh, and we tuned by plug color.  No electronics.  You learned a lot about fuel and air mixture/delivery working with carbs. 

 

Research data shows you do not lose focus on a speedo.  Same data shows you lose focus with excessive gauges.  Thats why OEMs pick and choose what you get very carefully.  

 

Buy your gauges.  Dont look for sympathy when you put it in the K rails watching gauges.  Or  losing it on a back country road into the woods.  Pray no one is hurt, including yourself.  Enjoy your blinky lights.  

 

Just for fun, these are old so my apologies, but back in the late 90's early 00's when I raced for Honda and Yamaha my bikes had ZERO gauges.  Cant seem to find any bar pix right now, it was long ago.  But here is my Honda that I campaigned in Baja.  Bike cost over 4 times more than my brand new 08 LGT SpecB.  No gauges, only a single green lamp to indicate neutral.  I raced Baja and the National Circuit for two manufactures and I never had anything more than a neutral indicator lamp.  Hear it, feel it concentrate on the track.

 

The voice of sanity has spoken. 

Edited March 9, 2023 by m sprank

[KZJonny]

Dude. We get it, you don't think gauges are okay. They're a distraction that kill people and are useless. We can respect your opinion, disagree and be allowed to have our own. There needs to be room on this forum for discussion, and logical, factually supported arguements that people don't agree with. Yelling and raging at people who disagree with you is the tactic of bullies and dictators. Civil discussion while recognizing differing opinions is the better option.

 

May I politely offer up the following information shared with me by Keith Law, of Specialty Engineering, BC, Canada. You probably won't know who that is, but in our little country, he was one of the first guys to strap a blow-through carberettor and a turbo onto a Datun 510 and lay some hurt on the Porches of the day. He was instrumental in developing a better turbo system for these cars, and part of the BC racing circuit with a gang of other smart people and engineers since the 70s. Smarter guy than me by every metric and who probably has more experience with cars than even you do. He's was racing cars before most of the folks using this site were born.

This is a (poor) shot of his cockpit, showing some of the gauges he runs in his street/race 510.

That's 7 within frame, and there are a couple more, I just couldn't find all the photos right now.

 

Below is part of our discussion about using a wideband and installing a gauge etc... Part of a longer conversation about doing something better and smarter than plug chops and reading plugs constantly. Note that most of the cars they work on get AFR gauges.

Does this mean that all gauges are good all the time? No.

Does this meant that F&F style gauge packs are okay? No.

Hell, it doesn't even mean that Keith is right to be doing this. But you can bet he does not spend most of his time looking at gauges while whipping his insanely quick turbo 510 along the mountain passed of BC. I thought you might appreciate a good 510 story.

This is a race car, built by an engineer with almost 50 years of track racing and "enthusiastic street driving".

Yes, of course he could be using digital data management and 'proper' logging gear with no gauges and some LEDs. In this case, he does not, because the supercomputer between your ears is up to the task of tracking/following/observing data to the point where something that is not okay is noticed. They tune on a dyno of course, but also look at realtime data. This is simply something they're used to and continue to do: there is more than one way to solve a problem/accomplish a task.

 

For the record; I am just trying to point out that there can be more the one correct solution to a problem. You can come back around and hate on me all you like, but if we are trying to create a place for constructive conversation, I'm going to point out that the attitude that says "I am right and all others are wrong" isn't terribly helpful.

 

 

Edited March 9, 2023 by KZJonny

[m sprank]

Just pointing out that the turbo 510 is from 2020 according to the post date.  Team Datsun dissolved in 1984.  SCCA rules did not allow for turbo 510's.  We raced against BMW 2002's mainly.  There were no turbo 510s at the time, lol.  Dual SU or Weber carbs, factory race headers, cam/port/polish/valve job, etc.  All motor.  Most parts were available from the Datsun Factory Racing Catalog, yeah the manufactures used to sell you the real race parts back in the 70's, LOL. 

 

Probably an exciting car to drive.  I doubt he looks at his gauges much, he knows to drive.  He probably also knows not to read the gauges, but to recognize where they should be and if one is out of position (during a millisecond of a glance), get off throttle.   It appears the center gauge in the cluster has a hi limit tattle tail already set.  Car was tested and shaken down on the dyno.  He is  not anticipating any issues.  Also please note that the AEM wideband he is using (one of my favorites) easily hooks up to a logger for storing the real time data.  It is far easier to look at the log after the fact and get all the info than try to read all the gauges, make mental notes and not become distracted. 

For California residents and states that follow CARB regulations an aftermarket boost gauge is illegal.  Tapping in to the vacuum line is considered a "tamper" and not approved by CARB.  Police can also use visible gauges as probable cause to pull you over and inspect for illegal modifications. 

 

Carry on.

[KZJonny]

38 minutes ago, m sprank said:

Just pointing out that the turbo 510 is from 2020 according to the post date.  Team Datsun dissolved in 1984.  SCCA rules did not allow for turbo 510's.  We raced against BMW 2002's mainly.  There were no turbo 510s at the time, lol.  Dual SU or Weber carbs, factory race headers, cam/port/polish/valve job, etc.  All motor.  Most parts were available from the Datsun Factory Racing Catalog, yeah the manufactures used to sell you the real race parts back in the 70's, LOL. 

 

Probably an exciting car to drive.  I doubt he looks at his gauges much, he knows to drive.  He probably also knows not to read the gauges, but to recognize where they should be and if one is out of position (during a millisecond of a glance), get off throttle.   It appears the center gauge in the cluster has a hi limit tattle tail already set.  Car was tested and shaken down on the dyno.  He is  not anticipating any issues.  Also please note that the AEM wideband he is using (one of my favorites) easily hooks up to a logger for storing the real time data.  It is far easier to look at the log after the fact and get all the info than try to read all the gauges, make mental notes and not become distracted. 

For California residents and states that follow CARB regulations an aftermarket boost gauge is illegal.  Tapping in to the vacuum line is considered a "tamper" and not approved by CARB.  Police can also use visible gauges as probable cause to pull you over and inspect for illegal modifications. 

 

Carry on.

Agreed.

I wish I was back on the West Coast and could go for a ride along in that thing instead of just chatting with these legends via email.

And no, I do not believe any of the cars and of these guys were building were official Team Datsun, they were mainly racing in BC-only leagues, or at least it was people from the PNW who participated.

Lots of crazy stories and old photos over on the510realm.com 

[m sprank]

Keep in mind a car with carbs has no ecm. No sensors. So without a very expensive aftermarket system you need some guages to tune when force inducted.   I do admit that.  However, the 4th gen LGT has an advanced electronic system from the factory that is monitorinag all you need.  It can easily be used without aftermarket guages. 

510s are light and this contributes to the ability to make them fast and agile (to a point).  However i have been involved in a few decent crashes in them.  Tin cans.  Not 5 star rated. 

[Febreze Mee]

Now, I want to just watch the gauges and maybe glance at the road every once in awhile out of spite . After I'm finished dancing with the K rails, it's your for $500.

What do you say?

[m sprank]

I would rather you not wreck your car and chance injuring anyone.  I give advice based on my experience.  I have attended funerals for friends and acquaintances that did not survive the race, I prefer to attend no more. 

Its your car, its your money.  Distractions cause accidents.  Same advice I gave to customers at my shop.  There were times I refused the work because I did not want to contribute to the potential happenings.  I love the mid-way at the fair too, my dash does not have to resemble it for me to know my vehicles health. 

 

According to the CDC Nine people in the United States are killed every day in crashes that are reported to involve a distracted driver.

[KZJonny]

3 hours ago, m sprank said:

510s are light and this contributes to the ability to make them fast and agile (to a point).  However i have been involved in a few decent crashes in them.  Tin cans.  Not 5 star rated.

I'm dragging this off topic again... but what the hell. Yeah, this is why the plans to do an engine swaps into it with something modern and powerful are over for me now. L20B and a weber +cam is all she'll get. Drive and enjoy.

Crumple zones and airbags are a thing. I'll put more speed money into a modern car, and leave the 510 a vintage fun thing with an old carby engine. (OK, maybe ITB swap it, we'll see, but the L series is there until it dies.....)

When I finally get into that project, I'll put someting up in the non-Subaru folder.

 

Now, back to discussing Defi gauges....

[m sprank]

Datsun 2000 swap into a '72 510.  SRl311 - 1982cc and 135hp of overhead cam fury.  5sp on the floor.  My dads dream car.  Enough said. 

[ChicagoSam]

but they look cool instead of a Nav unit...