Dakota Digital or Z&M gauges

[asdrsd]

Has anyone installed either the Dakota Digital or Z&M gauges,how much trouble for either to install and do they work good? I can't find a stock cluster thats working so I'm going to install one of these, I'm not sure which one.
Thanks,Scott

[Lindel]

Dakota Digital makes gauges, Z&M makes dash inserts to put gauges in. 3 3/8th" for the tach and speedo and 2 1/16th for the smaller gauge sets.

You can use any brand gauges you want in Zack's panel, or I believe he'll set you up with gauges of your choice, but I'm not positive about that.

[shackwrrr]

zach has panels pre loaded I vote zachs because I had an s10 blazer once with digi guages and I did not like them, I like to have a needle that moves

[zmjeeps]

As Lindel noted above, I sell panels that you can fill with your own gauges, or we can discuss which style of gauges you like and I can send you a fully wired panel ready to install. The fully wired panels come with a book of instructions that walk you through the install.

Zack

[FSJ-Earl]

I have a set of ZM Jeeps guages in my 89 GW and they are AWESOME! The look good and work great.

http://www.jeepsrus.org/megabbs/photos/get-photo.asp?photoid=249

http://www.jeepsrus.org/megabbs/photos/get-photo.asp?photoid=251

http://www.jeepsrus.org/megabbs/photos/get-photo.asp?photoid=252

http://www.jeepsrus.org/megabbs/photos/get-photo.asp?photoid=250

[aerocorey]

I know these aren't exactly high performance tactical aircraft, but for what it's worth the gubment did some published studies years back on digital heads-up displays for pilots. They tried sevaral layouts, but the 3 basic ideas were simple number displays, digitally displayed round gauges, and sliding scale displays. It seems that the amount of time it takes for the human brain to look at simple displayed numbers, process the info, determine a trend and react is much higher than display methods that show data against a stationary reference. The old fashioned round gauges beat everything else in reaction time. It's easy for the brain to interpret the winding or unwinding of a round gauge and easy to notice if a needle doesn't appear to be where it should be or normally is even without having to look directly at it.

There's a bunch of gee whiz stuff for ya.

[Kaiser]

Said it before and I'll say it again...
Doing the Dakota Digital system was one of the ABSOLUTE BEST things Ive done to my rig. I'd do it several times over. I had a full Autometer system, but the DD is way nicer. Installation was trick and super easy with great paperwork.
Between the two I dont think you could go wrong...
http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c327/gstupid/PC101748.jpg

[billyrb]

seems this should be in the vendor's section

[Retro93]

YUP...soon to be... ;)

[asdrsd]

Thanks for the info, I'll call Zack when I'm ready.
Scott

[Madduck]

hope this isn't thread creep...zach did you do a gage cluster using the autometer quad gage and a speedo that also had the tach on the same gage? what was the name of the speedo gage please. i love that they came out with that quad, makes it possible for me to get all the gages i want on my panel, in analog...creep off.

i gotta agree with aero, go with the needles. a quick glance will tell you where you're at much quicker and easier in my opinion.

thx all,
jason

[zmjeeps]

hope this isn't thread creep...zach did you do a gage cluster using the autometer quad gage and a speedo that also had the tach on the same gage? what was the name of the speedo gage please. i love that they came out with that quad, makes it possible for me to get all the gages i want on my panel, in analog...creep off.
thx all,
jason

Yes, that was me. PM or email me if you like. Thanks,

Zack

[TPICherokee]

Really, it just goes to what you prefer. I now have the Z&M panel with Autometer gauges in my Cherokee and I was going to convert it over to the digital dash because I like the way it turned out. In the future I may switch it back as I do like analog gauges also.

Buying the Z&M Panel with all of the gauges wired up is probably the easiest way to go, wiring wise.

The Dakota Digital dash has a box that you put all of your wires into, you can mount this box within 3 feet of the dashboard, anywhere you want, and when you install the dash, you simply plug it into the box (the dash is prewired).

[FSJ-Earl]

seems this should be in the vendor's section

What was wrong with where it was?

[78J10honcho]

it seems that with the addition of the vendor forum if you want to mention an item available through one of the vendors then the thread should be in the vendor forum rather than a tech or general forum.

[crazydog]

Here are my VDO gauges I sent to Zack to mount in one of his panels.

http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/mkubacak/PICT0336.jpg

http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/mkubacak/PICT0334.jpg