[V8] Arrival of "The Black Mariah"...

[Tony and Lillie]

Subject: [V8] Arrival of "The Black Mariah"...


The sunroof switch is cooched.  It insists on flipping the lid regardless of
which way the switch is moved.  I don't really care about this, as for the
most part I prefer to have the roof closed entirely, but it still isnt'
quite right.

I drill a hole in the side (about 1.8"), and spray contact cleaner into them. This has worked about 75% of the time for me. I use this for window switches as well.

The instrument cluster is goofy.  To begin with, we knew that there was a
sort of pulsing in the speedometer, and that the trip computer and odometer
was intermittent to say the least.  Well, now, the speedometer, and odometer
are spot on, and there is no "bumping" as was the case before.  But I still
do not have full instrument cluster digital performance, although all gauges
are working normally.  Hmmmm.  The Wrench thinks it is a bad cluster, citing
tha the has had a few clusters that just went bad and needed to be replaced.
Could be. Any comments?

I've fixed two now by simply taking them completely apart and putting them back together. It appears that corossion gets into the pins that make contact from one board to the other. It doesn't hurt to spray with contact cleaner as well. I use Radio Shack brand, because it leaves a coating of di-electric on the board.

I am also very interested in learning more about engine mods that will
maintain livability with even more...ah..."punch"....

Check out the archives (quattro) for Javad Shatzi. He has a 20V built over 500whp. Should get "Black Mariah" going down the road pretty well :-)

Tony Hoffman

I'll put up more as my experience with "The Black Mariah" deepens....

Roger