HI everyone....
Long day yesterday.....I couldn't login to address the points brought forth.
I see the word "plug and play" come up alot, and I know I mentioned that word in my first post, but we need to remove that from our vocabulary. I owned my first Regal turbo a hot air T Type in 1989, and an 1987 GN in 1991, I installed my first GNX style AVC dash in 1992 of which I bought from Kirban for $888.
But in reality nothing earth shatteringly different has developed since then.
You will always have to remove idiot light senders in the engine and run wires to the gauges. (Oil pres, water temp) Tee into the manifold vac/boost line and run one for the boost gauge. The tach needs to be plugged into the white wires by the alternator or if those are toast, tapped into the white wire by the coil and a tach converter module used for the tach signal. And wires run to the tach gauge.
The biggist PIA is the 2 pulse VSS signal since all aftermarket and modern gauges I know of use 16 pulse (more accurate) but even that.. Caspers has a converter, or some guys opt to use a dual head cable/wire on the transmission speedo gear output and send the cable to the factory speedo head hidden under the dash and the wire going to the speedo gauge. The gas gauge is the only one close to "plug and play".
My point is, the design of the car makes it difficult for other than GM or God Himself to make a plug and play cluster and if it was available it would be so expensive to produce, no one would want to buy it.
I intend to make installation as easy as possible, with installation parts package or lists etc; but than again I do not intend to be a vendor for these--more of the group buy leader. I am NOT profiting from the sale of these other than having a great looking, well working, cluster in my car. I was getting so tired of that sorry aftermarket POS and yet couldn't bring myself to put the old one back in and have 5 gauges peppered all over the interior.
BUT I need to mention..... KNOW THIS in my mind will probably be a 1 shot deal if everyone takes the wait and see approach.
As per my discussion with the company rep they will not process a bunch of individual orders, but will process a group buy. This is not going to be a catalog item for their company.
As for the lines of gauges an individual should be able to order whichever series they offer as long as it fits. I am looking into what the warranty is on them. I did not see any digital gauges in their product line.
Price should be well under the $999 Mustang dash since that is a plug and play. But expect that cost to be offset by buying as few senders, wiring, and Caspers harnesses and /or converters. I will look into possibly doing a bulk purchase for these to but I need to see how many are being instrument panels are being produced first.
Its really not a difficult install it very similar to car stereo installs, take your time and do it right. My target is to have a top quality piece that makes the install go smoothly.
I appreciate everyone's input and encourage you to tell any of your GN comrades who might be interested about this thread.
Stay tuned as I will keep you informed of developments as they occur.