Convert Mechanical Speedo to Electronic : ditching cable and using VSS

[erice1984]

I was curious if anyone had any insight as to what might be involved with ditching the mechanical speedometer/cable setup that is on my 1980 Rabbit Diesel 020 manual 4spd trans.  Replacing it with a newer gauge cluster possibly early 2000 model requiring the VSS (vehicle speed sensor) to tell the cluster vehicle speed etc..

I have read that the 96-ish years transmission had a VSS that has the same flange/attaching pattern as the speedo cable does. But I think I would have to do something inside the trans to change out the cable drive for a speedo gear or something since the VSS is a magnetic sensor.

Just hoping someone with the knowledge of these cars can shed some light on this possibility.

Thanks
-Eric

[lord_verminaard]

Impossible.  If you could get the VSS to drive the speed on the newer cluster, you couldn't get any other gauges in the cluster to work, since they all require can-bus or ECU interface.  And the clusters/ECU won't work unless you swap the immobilizer in from the newer car.  That's a whole hell of a lot of wiring to just get electrical speed.

The newer style VSS's actually have a little gear on them that is driven off of the gear in the transmission that drives the cable-operated speedo, the sensor converts the signal to electronic.  But I don't know if they can be driven by the old-style gear inside the transmission.

Any reason why you'd want to do this?  The mechanical setup works fine.  (as long as the cluster gears aren't broken)

Brendan

[erice1984]

previous owner messed up this rabbit pretty bad, and i hate the dash, and the cluster he had in it.  (i am pretty sure he didn't swap the support beam from the donor car for the dash. so it sags in the middle and is cracked in 2 places.)  Was just trying to explore the possibilities here.  So new cluster is out of the question, what about autometer and the sorts like that.  If I am getting rid of the mechanical drive speedo cluster than why not the cable as well?

Thanks for insight

[burn_your_money]

You could swap in a mk3 AAZ cluster and electronic speedo without the immobilizer and ECU and all that other junk. They are typically junk though and frequently crap out.

[erice1984]

Yea, not fond of junk parts.  What years did the VSS come out of that has the gear on it? to use in my trans (or try to).

[burn_your_money]

You want one from a mk3 020. I don't know if the gas ones got them or not (probably) but the diesel AAZs in Canada did.

[erice1984]

Save me lots of time man.  Thanks.

[Vincent Waldon]

20 bucks from the Worldpac guys

[erice1984]

I finally hooked up my VDO speedometer part number 437-050 using a VSS part number 1H0919149A in my rabbit diesel.

Although the sensor I used has a low impulse per revolution so it makes the speedo jump up and down a little +/- 1/2 to 1mph

Other than that it works really well.

I would like to try the sensor recommended above for $20 bucks.