Removing clear plastic cover from speedometer gauge cluster

knottyy

Hi guys,
I am trying to remove the clear plastic cover that goes over my speedometer gauge cluster so that I can clean the back side of it. Water sitting in my car from the previous owner let mold grow, and the splotches on the rear of the clear plastic speedometer cover are driving me crazy....I just wanna wipe that damn thing clean! I've got my gauge cover off, but I can't see a way to detach the plastic cover and it doesn't say how either in the Haynes. Looks like it might be glued/sealed on? Anyone have any ideas on how to get this apart so I can clean the inside? I went ahead and ordered some LED's from eBay to replace the original dash lights for a nice, clean white light as I saw a post on here about someone doing that. I just hope that I ordered the right ones.

knottyy

I just realized that I can remove a small piece on the top that houses two of the lights, and there's a small window I can reach in. Better than nothing for now.

simplyhonda

It is glued on pretty good. You can heat the glue and try to pry it off. Mine was cracked when I got it and a crack would never do. I preyed mine off but it broke in like three pieces. I tried some others in the junkyard, most of them broke. I ended up rocking mine with no cover. The gauges never looked better. Just have to be careful not to damages when cleaning etc.
Before:

After:

spikehead221

you have to take to cluster out of the vehicle in order to take the clear cover off. depending on the year, they are slightly different. for the 88-89, remove the plastic trim that has the center vents, held in by 4 screws and unplug the switches. take the 2 little caps off the back cover of the cluster to get to the 2 screws holding that it. the rear cover has 3 press clips you might have to fight, mine broke 2 of the 3 when i pulled mine out. i dont have the cover over the column, cant remember if it gets in the way or not. after all that is off, there are 4 screws holding in the cluster, but make sure you disconnect the 2 electrical clips and the speedo cable. should be able to weasel it out. to get the actual clear cover off the cover, i grabbed a couple small flat head screw drivers, pressed on the tabs, and worked the screw drivers around so it couldnt re-snap back in place. from there, you also have access to the bulbs on the back of the cluster. i have some pics, as soon as i can, i will show you what i mean.

knottyy

Thanks for adding some info, I should have reported back with what I found as I did end up getting the plastic cover off from the cluster. You're right, you need to remove the whole thing, and then there are 4 black plastic tabs that insert into the white plastic housing. Simply press those (all at once, if you do one side first it kinda gets stuck...gotta take the whole cover off evenly and at once I found) and pull the cover off. Voila! Thanks for your comment and reminding me to add more to this.