Interior: Dashboard, Gauges and Radio.

So we showed yesterday what the stock cluster and dashboard look like. We need to make a few changes, but overall we want to retain the look and feel of a 70's Japanese car.

To start with, we need new gauges. The factory gauges were engine speed, vehicle speed, oil pressure, fuel level, battery voltage, engine temp and a clock. Two 4" gauges and three 2 and 5/8th gauges for the center gauges.

So, we need to decide what information we want quick access to. Vehicle speed and engine speed are definite so that takes both the 4" spots.

We'll be using Speedhut custom GPS Speedometer for our car. Since your speedometer reading changes depending on transmission gearing, rear differential gearing and overall rear tire size the best way to make sure our speed is accurate is to use GPS to track our speed in real time. An added bonus, this gauge has a fuel level gauge built in so no need for it's own gauge.

We'll probably end up using all Speedhut due to the high quality product. Also I would like to keep the shade of lighting and text font the same on all gauges.

We're most likely going to have a turbo on our engine so our quick info readout is going to be (in order) Boost, Engine Temp, Oil Pressure. We might at an Air/Fuel Ratio and Oil temp but those would be for tuning purposes and would be in the glove box.

Basic idea, like this but no gauges in the heater controls.

So we have our gauges, now we need a steering wheel and shift knob.

Light wood with a black spoke just screams class. We can tinker with finding the right brand and size, but this is about it for me. Shift knob to match, but that depends on the transmission we use.

Last part of the dashboard is a radio. I have an old Alpine that I'll be running. We'll get some speaker pods for under the dash and for the trunk.

Here's an installed front speaker.

And here's a box made for rear speakers. Throw a small sub in there somewhere and you have a great little sound system.

Next time we talk about the trunk/luggage area/hatch and safety.