Cody92

Hey everyone I'm a new member looking for some good advice on an issue IV been fumbling with. I own a 1998 Honda Civic DX and have gone through the cat getting it all up to date. Iv replaced the entire distributor, alternator, tss , struts, and recently a new gauge cluster to add a tachometer to the bare gauges my dx came with. My problem now is that the tach IV newly acquired is jumpy and works correctly 30% of the time. I'm assuming this is an electrical issue but iv already replaced the distributor so that leaves in between somewhere? Hoping someone else has had this issue. I was told the gauge swap was simply plug and play. Thanks everyone.

Cody92

I should also add that it doesn't seem to effect the way the car runs.

muellersfan

The tach itself may be the problem.

Cody92

Is there a way to test it without another tach to swap in? I just bought it from what I thought was a trusted seller. It was supposedly tested before shipping to me. $100 down the drain possibly.

muellersfan

Sellers lie. You can return it for a refund.

Amazon sells gadgets that read rpm.

Many OBD2 code readers read live data, such as engine rpms. Maybe you have a friend who has one?

If you lived in Houston, I'd lone you mine.

Cody92

I have a mechanic that could hook up to it, he didn't wanna drive into the wiring. Oddly enough it worked perfect on my way home for lunch break just now. Grounds possibly?

muellersfan

^Let him.

If when the tach is jumpy, the code reader is steady, you have your answer.

Any CEL codes?

Cody92

Negative on the cel codes. A bare wire or something along those lines wouldn't cause it working fine sometimes and most times not? I appreciate the input btw guys this is very helpful 😊.

Cody92

Well I got another cluster to swap the tach from and it's doing the exact same things and I'm about to give up on this because I'm not electricaly skilled.

muellersfan

Does the CEL work or did you hook up a code reader?

Cody92

CEL does work, it's been hooked up and I just got done clearing a crankshaft position code through an entire distributor replacement. Car had the wrong distributor when I bought it. Runs smooth now.

muellersfan

As an experiment, run a fresh new tach wire from the ICM to the cluster to see if the problem is eliminated.