Plattinum SC

Is there a way or source that can make these switches but do different functions, say maybe control an exterior light such as fog lights or something?

houtex

Welcome to the forums!

With a dremel, soldering iron, some wire, and then a custom built module to do whatever it is you're lookin' for, absolutely.

Now... that's the 'easy' way, hacking the switches directly to do what you want, not what they intended. Of course, if you do that, the lil' computer in the gauge cluster won't be changable, so keep that in mind. I'd get a whole other switch block and play with that. Also, I might figure out how to keep the old one intact and in place so you can not have any issues with the car wanting to see the thing, can't be sure it won't be upset. Probably not, but still. And hey, I like to reset my trip, so... yeah.

Past that, the switches are just momentary on switches, very low voltage and amps. You should be able to pin out the pins directly off the thing, as well as the lighting, from the board itself and solder new leads, abandoning the old functions with ease.

What're you planning to do with the thing? Very curious!

Hope that helps!

Plattinum SC

I'd like to keep buttons in tact. They won't be used to the mustang. I only have a mustang dash I put in a project truck. Came to this forum looking for some insight. I thought maybe the switches themself were like normal switches. Then I could sand off bottom face and and apply my own. Utilizing these switches and housing for my own purposes.

VGMStudios

You can do that exactly. Just find the proper pins in the back and connect to them. I did the same thing as I rerouted my hazard button. As Houtex mentioned they are just switches.

Plattinum SC

Awesome news. Thanks for the info. These are illuminated right? Haven't taken apart just yet. But hoping I can lightly sand and apply my own symbols...


Or a way to make the momentary style change to off/on style...

houtex

Nosir, that won't work. Not that directly anyway, not on this button set. That hazard is a discrete button, apparently. I hate to be that bearer, but it's exactly why I spoke of dremels and soldering and such. You have to get them buttons directly.. well, mostly, there's always a way, y'know. See below.

Yeppers, they're illuminated alright. Here's the wiring diagram:
http://iihs.net/fsm/?d=40&f=Instrume...luster.pdf&p=2

There's four pins involved. Pins 1 and 4 are the ones to run the lamps, which are set green. 1 is incoming power, 4 is ground. That'll cover the lights.

The other two pins, 2 and 3, are separately wired to the instrument cluster. 2 is the input power from the instrument cluster, and 3 is the return. Using 3 different value resistors wired to the open side of the microswitches lets the instrument cluster 'hear' the correct switch as needed, even simultaneous presses can be gleaned from the combined resistors of two or three switches and can be parsed out. Less wires that way, simpler connector all that. That's how these things work these days, not like the pre-S197 days at all. All communications and resistive trickery. It's magic and it's annoying sometimes.

Anyway. That's why the dremel and solder and wire and such. You have to either create a module to communicate with the switches (like an arduino or raspberry pi or such, after finding the values yourself with a multimeter and then parsing in the module you make and program), or you have to directly wire the switches.

My dad would opt for the arduino. He uses one to run his Falcon's fuel gauge, for example. He uses a Ford sender in the tank, wired to the arduino, program is set with a table (one gallon at a time, measure values, repeat...) and an anti-slosh algorithm to keep the gauge from jumpin' around, and tada, the GM compatible gauge now works! He liked the gauge that much he *made* it work (it was a 'look', and they didn't have a Ford one, of course). He does stuff like that, the smarty pants. And so you could do with this switch... if you didn't want to/can't dremel/wire it up.

Me? Dremel. Let's go.

Again, hope that helps! Good dang luck!

Cavero

From an engineering perspective, that resistor trick is ingenious, from a maintenance side of things -- damned engineers. Those switches are normally open momentary switches, so they only pass current for as long as you are holding them down. So you could rewire them at the connector, but they would only give you a pulse for as long as you pressed the switch down. You could make whatever you're trying to do with them stay that way by either going with the nuclear option (Arduino), or you could build a relatively simple logic circuit. A toggle circuit will go steady on when you push the button and go off when you push the button again. A latching circuit will go steady on when you press one button and turn off when you press a separate reset button.

It's been a LONG time since I did anything with logic circuits, so depending on how serious you are about going that route, I can start dusting off cobwebs if you want to go that route.

SpectreH

Logic circuit would be the way to go. That reminds me of a software change I was asked to make for the pilot's HUD on the old AC-130H gunships. There were 5 buttons that selected which of 4 sensors a look angle symbol referenced (5th button was OFF). They decided they wanted one button to toggle through those 4 sensors and OFF, and the other four buttons to toggle on/off a symbol to show where each sensor was looking. Those buttons weren't designed for that and had terrible "bounce" when pressed and released. I added logic to detect the input, then delay long enough for the bounce to end. Without that logic, it was crapshoot as to what you ended up with as the sightlines flickered on and off rapidly to the switches bounce. I was just thankful that we had a lab to test everything in so that what went to the aircraft worked as they wanted.