i plan on building a new engine here soon....more than likely a 383 but i might go bigger. but i wanna keep my camaro a stock looking car, kinda like a sleeper. im wondering if i can rely on stock style intruments with a high performance engine

They'll be okay if you don't drive it when its hot, or drive it hard, I personally don't trust them much, they have too much error in their measurement for my tastes. There are many places to hide a small set of gages. I overheated mine one hot summer day and blew my rad to pieces, the temp gauge still said it was okthough.

If you test them and know what the readings mean there is no reason not to trust any guage, no matter how you drive your car. Even a temp guage with 4 of 5 hash marks is fine if you know that straight up on the guage is 210 degs and halfway back to the previous hash mark is 180 degs.

You said "stock style", does that mean repro? Should be better than factory if so, after all they are new. I know lots of 35 yr old cars that the stock guages are still working. They're fairly tough...

YEAH I DO MEAN REPO...SORRY, MY CAR IS (WAS) A 69 BASE V8 COUPE SO IT HAS 120 MPH SPEEDO AND NO TACH. IM GONNA PUT IN A 140 MPH SPEEDO AND THE EARLY 396/375 - Z28 TACH (6000X8000) AND CONSOLE GAUGES

If using the repro tach I would check for accuracy. If you are using an original part you may want to check out my website for some info on repairing the original part.

I do agree with Dennis. There's nothing wrong with stock parts as long as they are calibrated correctly. I've seen too many aftermarket temperature gauges that are way off so it's worthwhile to check them as well.

Have you seen the autometer set up to mount four 2 1/16 gauges in place of the front console panel? It looks clean, almost stock looking. Would be a nice place to mount a clean set of VDO's

Good Luck

The only drawback for the stock tach might be some delay in the sweep of the needle. An aftermarket or rebuild with good internals might track more accurately. I have a stock tach but use a shift light.

I've got a 68 Firebird speedo that goes to 160! :eek: :eek: