Carrera Gauge Swap

[EJ-Fresno]

Originally Posted by mikesz

Yes my interior is Boxster red, probably the biggest reason we got the car. I will let you know. I just purchased another surround to try to cut it as a guinea pig. I will try with the dremel and keep fingers crossed. Do you still have the programmer gadget you used to update the eprom on the new cluster? Did the wire come with the programmer or is there a special gadget needed to connect the programmer to the cluster?

I did swap clusters and thus have a EPROM programmer available for sale.
I'll PM you.

[mikesz]

how about running the wire from the new oil sender to the dash? where is the oil pressure switch located? What guage wire did you use to wire it up to the new cluster in the dash?

[KevinH1990]

Here's a picture of the oil pressure sending unit: http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarticles/Boxster_Tech/90-ELEC-996_Cluster/images_med/Pic6.jpg To install mine, I found that I had to open the access port behind the seats and also put the top in service position and have access from the top.

To run the wire to the dash, I used some 16 or 18 gauge wire I bought at an auto parts store. I removed the center console and ran it underneath. Once you take out the console, the path is obvious. http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarticles/Boxster_Tech/90-ELEC-996_Cluster/images_med/Pic7.jpg

The entire article is on Pelican: Porsche Boxster 996 Gauge Cluster Upgrade - 986 / 987 (1997-08) - Pelican Parts Technical Article

[mikesz]

How can you determine what chip you have so you can select it on the eprom programmer to read it? I have a comparable guage cluster from a 996, a eprom programmer. I am at the point where i am trying to read the chip on the 996 cluster but there are many 93c56 chips to choose from.

[KevinH1990]

Mike,


I've seen some folks on Boxa.net indicate that they have had problems reading the chip when they used certain programmers other than the GQ-4X. You can read about it here: How to - Upgrade to a 996 Instrument Cluster - How To - www.BoXa.net

It has been a long time since I did this, but I remember that I had to swap the bits that I read from the chip.

[hemonu]

Hello Mike, just choose one of the many. Most programmers allow to choose many vendors for the same chip with identical pinning and specification.
I used a cheap programmer instead of the GQ-4X. The problem was that the chip is inside the circuit board and the supply voltage goes from the 93C56 to all the circuits. That causes the overload protection of the programmer to shut down the 5V. My workaround was to power the gauge with 12 V from the connector and voila ... I can read and write the EEPROM.

[mikesz]

I am asking when you hook up the programmer to the chip, Does the programmer automatically recognize the chip? When I connect everything up and click the read button it says the read was successful but I expect the data to show on my laptop and it doesn't. Admittedly I am using a programmer other than the GQ4x. but again if I used a gq4x when everything is connected would the programmer automatically recognize the chip and when I click read the file would appear on the screen? I am not that worried about swapping out data I do it all the time its getting to that point that I am having issues with.

[Smallblock454]

Maybe this is useful:



Edit: Oh, it's also in the Boxa article linked above. Found it elsewhere.

Regards, Markus

[mikesz]

Hi Kevin, first off new LCD panels appear to be available and being sold on ebay. If you don't want to go that route you may want to contact Steve at Qumulus in Colorado he says he can fix damaged LCD's. He has my Boxster gauges and 996 cluster when I gave up trying to program it with the EPROM.