Cluster lights and gauge questions

[RottenDog]

I am installing aftermarket gauges in my truck.

I have some wiring questions and I will be referring to page 6-44 of the Chilton's manual.

I am also using Zack's aluminum guage pod.

Cluster lights- for the new gauges, can I run one hot wire (wire J) and connect all my guage lights to this one wire?

Is the connection and the display of the warning lights necessary?

I have an 100 amp alternator. I just discovered it says 65 amp on my new gauge. Will this work?

Does each individual gauge need to be grounded separately?

[sloop]

In-dash ammeters generally aren't a good safe idea. Run a thick wire from your battery post on your alternator directly to your battery. You can put a voltmeter in your dash to make sure your alternator is working.

[Gawdzilla.]

Hey Rotten- if I ever get down there I can show you my wiring setup. I've bypassed the amp, shortened the charging circuit and seen some improvements (i.e. brighter headlights)...

To answer your Q- Yes, you can run one hot wire and one ground wire. The cluster panel runs off of one wire anyway- the Orange J wire on your cluster plug.
There is a red wire w/a white tracer that comes off the headlight switch. That goes into the fuse block and then the orange wire is fused w/a 3amp fuse in the fuse block. The orange wire comes from there, branches out into 3 seperate wires to feed the instrument panel and I forget what else. All the lights in the panel are grounded with 1) a wire from the oil pressure gauge that connects to a plug on the back of the heater blower switch. That plug has another ground wire 2) that connects to ground.
I was up until 1am this morning redoing all of my cluster wiring. Noticed if you have one bulb out or the bulb clip is missing, none of them are gonna work. Also if it's not grounded, it won't work.

Warning lights are up to you. Watch your gauges and you should be fine w/out them.

[RottenDog]

Now that I started digging into the dash, playing with the gauges, sorting out the wiring and even reading the instructions for my gauges, things are starting to fall into place.

Had some electrical work done a year ago which included the bypass of the ammeter. I realized that this done as I sorted out the wiring. There is a huge discussion about this subject in the archives. This is good, cause that means I can mount my Trans guage in one of my four available holes.