Aftermarket Tach for 454 P30

I'm surprised that '93 is still using the old ECM - guessing the engine is '92? I built the 2 transistor circuit. Use a USB to serial adapter. For the money, if I were doing it again, I would probably just buy the OBDI to USB adapter. 8192 baud. The update is way faster than you can see. There is a bazillion (OK only ~220) things I could look at, if I want to. You can create your own dash board, so you choose what you want displayed and how you want it displayed. Everything from the O2 sensor, to your BLM - meaning mixture correction, to injector pulse width. Virtually anything the ECM is thinking about, you can display it on the screen. Yours being an older ECM, you won't have as many points of data, but still anything you would ever care about.

Daveinet wrote:
OBDI TunerPro will easily run on a small netbook. If you get one with a touch screen, it will take up even less space. Here is was mine looks like:

At the time I also ran the back camera through it.

Thats a very neat setup. I do have couple 2GB Acer Netbooks laying around. How did you connect it to ODBI v1 harness? I looked on schematics its 166 baud rate and there are few plans for making your own RS232 adapter for PC. Most modern PCs don't have RS232 serial ports anymore, I imagine this gonna require RS232 to USB adapter for PC.

Also, what kind of readouts can you get with your setup? Whats the refresh rate on data samples per second?

OBDI TunerPro will easily run on a small netbook. If you get one with a touch screen, it will take up even less space. Here is was mine looks like:

At the time I also ran the back camera through it.

nemo45 wrote:
If it was me, I'd just get a scan gauge. But, not sure if a 1993 has the proper connection for one. It would sure be a lot easier than hooking up a tach and you'd get a lot more information than a just a tach provides.

I looked in to it, my original plan was to get ODBII to bluetooth adapter and use google Nexus 7 mounted on the dash with a graphical ODB app to read out all the readings and sensors.

Unfortunately my chassis are equipped with ODB v1 and there are no aftermarket virtual gauge software that supports it other than a bulky PC based. The ODB II has standardized the data vehicles provide thus everyone uses that protocol. The original ODB was unique to each manufacturer or even model of the vehicle.

I don't want to over-complicate this project, however I feel like tach is just as important as the speedometer gauge. I'm used to driving boats so the proper RPMs is more important to me than the speed. :D

I would go with Summit gauges. They have their own brand name. You can buy digital readout packs for not too much money. As long as you are adding gauges, a vacuum gauge and a trans temp gauge are a must have.

Or if you have a tablet with Bluetooth, Get the "Torque" or "Torque Pro" app and a Bluetooth obd11 reader.

If it was me, I'd just get a scan gauge. But, not sure if a 1993 has the proper connection for one. It would sure be a lot easier than hooking up a tach and you'd get a lot more information than a just a tach provides.

We found one of those small Tachs at Walmart or Canadian Tire. it fit nicely into one of te Blanked out Spots on the Dash of Our Old 90 Southwind.

It came with complete instructions and plenty of illustrations!

Don't go with one of those huge tachs that the hot rod crowd loves. Get a small diameter 2 1/16 inch tack and mount it on top of your steering column. Auto Meter has them. I fabbed a bracket to mount it. You don't need or want a huge tach!

This one is 0 - 5000 rpm.

Auto Meter 2697

I would probably go to jegs or summit where you can compare all the different tach's and see which one you like. Most local auto parts stores (napa, o'reilly, etc) will have quit a few in stock. I'm sure they come with instructions, and our engines are from the era when we can still work on them. I have a '94 georgie boy, also without a tach. I will be watching this thread, I would like to put a tach in mine also.