Tach Lubrication

[Dan Kalinski]

Disassembled my tach and wondering what the recommended lubrication is for the axle and bushing.

Thanks

[Dave Erickson]

Probably sperm oil. Until the 1972 ban on whaling, sperm oil was widely used in the automotive industry. When I worked as an industrial chemist, many of the instrument mechanisms were lubricated with sperm oil.

[Dan Kalinski]

Thanks Dave. Think the use of lubricant of less exotic material will be used.


Have removed the tach and removed the bezel, glass and surround. So far, this was the hardest part of the process.

Have the guts removed.

Removed the mechanism from the housing and disassembled it to find very little lubrication. Don’t think it has been serviced in a very long time.

Cleaned all the old grease out with carb cleaner then a hot bath in the ultrasonic cleaner and cleaned once again with more carb spray.

Lubricated the shaft and housing with synthetic moly grease and used some corrosion X for the very small bushings. Going see how well this works and has to be a lot better than it was.

This work should eliminate the horrible noise it was making.

More to follow once the tach is back in the car.

[Mike Wilson]

How about watch oil for the internal parts?

Mike

[Jurgen Amtmann]

Dan,
I used to get small samples from NYE Lubricants. Call or write them for a sample of instrument oil, or whatever they suggest. Watch or clock oil would be appropriate. Jürgen

[Marcus van Bers]

You could also just call North Hollywood, Palo Alto or any other shop that restores instrument clusters and ask them what they use for lubrication.

[Dan Kalinski]

How about watch oil for the internal parts?

Mike

Thanks Mike.

Yes, watch oil would be good for swing of the needle. There are two places on the tach structure where this cental axle (the pointer) needs lubrication.

[Dan Kalinski]

Dan,
I used to get small samples from NYE Lubricants. Call or write them for a sample of instrument oil, or whatever they suggest. Watch or clock oil would be appropriate. Jürgen

Thank you, Jurgen.

I have another tach to service very soon and will call them for a bit of their lubricants.

Thank you!

[Dan Kalinski]

You could also just call North Hollywood, Palo Alto or any other shop that restores instrument clusters and ask them what they use for lubrication.

Thank you, Marcus.

Plan on calling them on Monday anyway and a good point to ask them for what they use..... if not a trade secret in their process. Think to, it would be nice to know what disassembly, clean, lubricate, put it back together would cost.

Appreciate everyone that takes the time to comment.

[Marcus van Bers]

...it would be nice to know what disassembly, clean, lubricate, put it back together would cost.

Appreciate everyone that takes the time to comment.

Make sure you are sitting down when they give you the price. The principal reason I have used them in the past is they have special machines that can unroll the chrome bezel from the front face and then roll it back on so it is tight and blemish free. Most YouTube videos show people using these thin screw drivers to fold the bezel back. I have tried this and it looks like crap. If I knew what machine they used and could get one I would do all my own gauges.

[Mike Wilson]

I found this with a Google search.

[Jim Clement]

and ..
After Dan has it all back together..
What and how do you lubricate the shaft ?
I have the assembly - that being the outer casing and the inner shaft..

[Dan Kalinski]

...it would be nice to know what disassembly, clean, lubricate, put it back together would cost.

Appreciate everyone that takes the time to comment.

Make sure you are sitting down when they give you the price. The principal reason I have used them in the past is they have special machines that can unroll the chrome bezel from the front face and then roll it back on so it is tight and blemish free. Most YouTube videos show people using these thin screw drivers to fold the bezel back. I have tried this and it looks like crap. If I knew what machine they used and could get one I would do all my own gauges.

Thanks again, Marcus. Below is the finished product on the bench and in the car. It looks ok, not perfect, but suitable for this car.

[Dan Kalinski]

I found this with a Google search.

Pretty dang Cool!

[Dan Kalinski]

and ..
After Dan has it all back together..
What and how do you lubricate the shaft ?
I have the assembly - that being the outer casing and the inner shaft..

Yeah, couldn’t wait for this one, but next time, will use something recommended by the experts. I did watch “Mike’s Restorations” on YouTube and he used a synthetic grease on the rotating magnet shaft (on his speedo) and a light oil on the indicator shaft.

Fully back together and on the bench. Bezel looks OK:

Installed in the car and for now, it works great. Note too the Stork Oil Temp Gauge is reporting accurate temperature:

Thanks for any input and thanks too for following along.

At first, had a bit of trepidation going into this project, turns out this was fun work to do with good results.