I recently replaced the standard white speedo & rpm gauge with Black ones from a GTR 1400. Something different, like the new look.

lookin good

Me likes!!

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Wow! Those look REALLY nice! Were they easy to install?

Carbon fiber ones would look bitchin too. How much was involved in swapping them out?

I have done it before on one of my previous bikes, so I had a good idea on how to do it.
I bought the dials on ebay, removed the clusted from the bike, split open the cover, popped off the needles, carefully peeled off the white gauges, stick the black ones in place, pushed the needles back and put the cluster back together temporarily.
It took a few attempts to get the needles to zero out after reconnected to the bike, but once I had it, I screwed the cluster back together permanently, and all done.
About 2 hours if you take your time.
The hardest part was to ensure no dust particles remain inside the cluster after you swapped it out.

I've been planning to put in some IllumaGlow faces on my Gen1. I thought the needles zeroed out to the peg automatically after pushing them back on. Always thought that was the purpose for the needle sweep when you turn the ignition on. Are saying you needed to take the case apart a few times to reposition the black faces so the needles would zero?

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Rook - The black faces stick on in a fixed position, they have holes and tabs that need to line up inside the cluster.
The needles did not zero out after the sweep, I had to remove and reposition them a few times.
Unfortunately i could not tell you if the speedo was reading incorrect, because i also replaced the front sprocket with a 16T and used my Healtech speedohealer to calibrate the speedo afterwards.

The needles did not zero out after the sweep, I had to remove and reposition them a few times.

Thanks. That is going to be a PITA when I do mine. Seems like it might be worthwhile to not push the needle all the way on incase I might need to pull it off again to reposition it. It sure seems like it should be as simple as positioning the needle so that it just kisses the stop pin. If it's not touching, it's not zeroed.....but what if it is touching but touching too hard?? Then you have it pinned at -3 mph or something like that. Now I ma starting to worry about tackling this job.

i also replaced the front sprocket with a 16T and used my Healtech speedohealer to calibrate the speedo afterwards.

I also have a Speedohealer and it has my speedo reading dead on at all speeds up to 90 mph by GPS. I suspect it is accurate above 90 mph but I haven't tested it against GPS at those speeds. It seems that if the needle doesn't get zeroed, the speedohealer should correct for that from where the needle starts. I do not think any correction by Speedohealer would cause the needle to zero. That would drive me nuts.

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Did you use a fork to lever the needles off when you removed them? I'm just wondering how tight those things fit on the center pin.

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Seems like it might be worthwhile to not push the needle all the way on incase I might need to pull it off again to reposition it

You are right, I only pushed the needles back slightly untill I had them in the correct spot. It's easy to notice if the needles strike the stop pins hard after the sweep, then adjust them untill they basically just stop on the pin. If you move the needle with your finger, you can feel a slight jump and it will stop. Almost like you have to apply just enough force to skip through a notch, and the needle will stop at the next notch. So when you adjust them, you can only move the needle from one notch to the next, it will not stop inbetween. (Hope this makes sense)

Did you use a fork to lever the needles off when you removed them? I'm just wondering how tight those things fit on the center pin

I used 2 teaspoons to pop the needles off. They where pretty tight and you have to use a reasonable amount of force, so be carefull.

Yes that's enough description of the notch feeling. I will figure it out when I get my gauge cluster apart.

Yeah, I heard those needles are stuck on there tight. Somewhere on here there is a tutorial for face changes and custom LEDs. It was many years back.

Thanks for the help!

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What ignition key hole cover ring is that? Do you have a link where you got it?