Like fine wine, your handbuilt Custom Shop gauges will be delivered in an exquisite cedar box.
First you tell the Custom...
First you tell the Custom Shop how many gauges you need in your package; customization begins with a clean white six-gauge system. We opted for electric sending units on our 160-mph 3⅜-inch speedo, 8,000-rpm tach, and 21/16 ancillary gauges. Fifteen colors are preloaded into the system for the dial, but since Custom Shop are hand-assembled per order, there is an option to choose a custom color that you provide.
Half of hot rodding is personalization. It’s the little touches and changes that express your personality that make your car unique. On the exterior it’s really the wheels that set the tone for a car, but on the interior we’d have to say it’s the gauges. Think about it: you spend an awful lot of time staring at your instrument cluster. Matter of fact, if you’re driving the way we like to drive, they’re the only thing getting a regular glance. You better like the way they look.
Our buddies at Auto Meter certainly have never been thin on options and offerings, and some of their out-of-the-catalog gauges have graced the highest-level hot rods and muscle cars without alteration; their American Muscle series are some of the best-looking ever created in our opinion. But there’s just something about being able to tweak and tailor a gauge to exactly what you want it to look like. Now imagine if you could do it hassle free and at home while staring at your dash.
That’s exactly what Auto Meter’s Director of Social Media Joseph Mills challenged his team to create. “We’ve always gotten special requests, and while we’ve always worked with our customers to provide them exactly what they want, there were limitations in what we could do, and the process wasn’t as easy as it should have been,” Mills told us. “We knew that we could do it better so we came up with a program that allows customers to design their own gauges.” Sounds like a simple idea, but implementing it in a user-friendly way was not: “It took 17 people working seven days a week since last May to perfect it,” Mills added.
We went for brushed aluminum...
We went for brushed aluminum and then swapped the font from Contemporary to the more traditional-looking Z-Series. This also shows one of our favorite options in the Custom Shop: choosing your ticking. Even more than the colors, this and the font really set the personality of the gauges. We went for the vintage European race-inspired Stack ST230 ticking.
The result was well worth the effort though; now just by clicking through a few screens and choosing your options in the Auto Meter Custom Shop, the possibilities expand exponentially; so far there are over 14 trillion combinations of Auto Meter gauges that you can create in the Custom Shop—and that number is only going to continue to grow as Mills and his team expand and refine the program. As of now the Custom Shop allows users to pick the number and type of gauges they want, dial color, font style and color, ticking style and color, retainer color, pointer style and color, bezel style and color, curved glass versus flat, and LED illumination versus incandescent. Yeah, it’s a lot to ponder.
We decided to create some distinctive gauges to replace the awful factory ones in Project EcoNova, our ’77 Nova disco-era machine, so follow along as we take you through the whole process from concept to experimentation, to getting the real deal in the car.
First you tell the Custom Shop how many gauges you need in your package; customization begins with a clean white six-gauge system. We opted for electric sending units on our 160-mph 3⅜-inch speedo, 8,000-rpm tach, and 21/16 ancillary gauges. Fifteen colors are preloaded into the system for the dial, but since Custom Shop are hand-assembled per order, there is an option to choose a custom color that you provide.
A silver pointer doesn’t work...
A silver pointer doesn’t work well on a brushed aluminum face, so it’s time to splash some color. We almost went with the knee-jerk traditional red, but instead decided to call out the green from the EcoNova’s logo. You can even do a different color tail if you prefer; match it to the gauge face and you get a floating effect. When have you ever been able to choose your pointer color? We also switched the color of the ticking to white and the retainer color to black to add more contrast to the face.
Chrome bezels are standard...
Chrome bezels are standard and look great on just about anything, but in the EcoNova’s black interior the cool Black Nickel bezel option creates a smoother transition of color to the gauge face. Auto Meter even lets you choose whether you prefer curved or flat glass. We stuck with flat.
Usually different series of...
Usually different series of gauges only carry one option for illumination, but in the Custom Shop you choose between traditional incandescent or LED. If you go with LED, you can pick from white, blue, red, green, or amber illumination. We went with white.
Auto Meter has a bank of cool...
Auto Meter has a bank of cool images from eight balls to iron crosses you can add to the center of the gauge face, but customer-supplied images aren’t available currently. Or, you can just add the model year of your car.
The virtual dashboard is the...
The virtual dashboard is the last step in the configurator. Here you can change the layout of the gauges, swap the dashboard colors, or add textures like carbon fiber and brushed aluminum or wood veneers. Like what you see? Hit “Print Kit at Actual Size” to get a high-quality 1:1 printout of your creation. Now you can place them in the car and see if you like them just as much.
Custom Shop gauges really...
Custom Shop gauges really are just that—fully custom. Once Auto Meter has your build sheet, each gauge is hand-painted, lettered, assembled, and tested by talented technicians. Check out the full step-by-step creation of our beautiful brushed speedo in the extended online version of this story at PopularHotRodding.com.
Usually pointers are just...
Usually pointers are just made in a solid color plastic with no options; in the Custom Shop they can be whatever you want them to be.
Instrument clusters don’t...
Instrument clusters don’t come much more useless than the factory setup in the EcoNova. We’ve got a speedo, a gas gauge, and a few idiot lights that don’t work on the left. The far right circle is blank.
Awesome instrumentation doesn’t...
Awesome instrumentation doesn’t do you much good if you can’t mount ’em. Classic Thunder Road carries drop-in dash inserts with and without gauges for most muscle cars pre-mounted, and they’re the only shop that actually builds them for our late fourth-gen (’77-79) Nova. They’re available blank or drilled for your gauge configuration. The stock dash is hopeless; these are really a no-brainer for only $279.
Installation in the precut...
Installation in the precut Classic Thunder Road dash insert only takes minutes, thanks to holes that are precut to exact dimensions for the gauges, and Auto Meter’s user-friendly gauge retainers. Want to see how all these gauges got wired? Watch for the web exclusive story on
PopularHotRodding.com.
Love the look? We sure do!...
Love the look? We sure do! The Custom Shop gauges are gorgeous and the Classic Thunder Road insert makes the swap look like GM had this much taste in 1977. We don’t mind sharing either; if you like our recipe for Auto Meter gauges just go to the Custom Shop instrument gallery and click on the Popular Hot Rodding EcoNova package. You can even change the pointer color!