guys, I bought a Mechanical boost gauge from glowshift, I understand the install all the way up to when it says "tap the red wire to a positive 12v ignition switched source. I dont know where to find one thats near, what do you guys think I need to use?

http://www.glowshift.com/instruction...cuum-Gauge.pdf

 

ALSO** Does anyone know the location of the of the narrowband oxygen sensor??? Picture or description, thankyou!

 

Your closest option is going to be to tap into the hot for the ignition, but even there, you will have to extend the wires in order to do so. I've wired several gauges up on other cars, its pretty simple, but I've yet to install any aftermarkets on my Cobalt. My one question, and you may have the answer, is where is the vacuum line on these cars?

 

If you have an LSJ.. then there is one coming off the top of the manifold.. right under the fuel rail kinda..

 

For the vac line, I think he needs just the ignition source. To be honest OP you're best bet is to take a continuity tester and just look around in the fuse panel for a source and is ignition only.

 

for my gauges I jus ran a wire to the wiper fuse in the panel down by the passengers feet. Its a switched 12v source

 

ok! Let me show you where I am at in this whole thing guys, So, I got the vacuum hose through the firewall, and tapped into the vacuum line. When I took off the stock boost gauge, i cut the plug off. I am left with a Tan wire, red wire, black with white stripe wire, and a grey wire. I am at a standstill from here. The Gauge itself has a orange, black, green and red wire coming off the plug. the green wire goes to the boost sensor, the boost sensor ALSO has a Red (+) and a black (-) wire coming off of it.
I was told you can just splice the positive wire into the the positive factory wire than ran to the factory boost gauge. is this CORRECT? I know you guys are telling me otherwise, but will it work? I spliced the red wire to the factory red wire, and the black to the factory black hoping I would get the gauge to boot up, but it didnt. Did I tap into the wrong colors or something? It would make sense that this would work! Heres a picture: You can kinda see that I spliced the red to red. and black to black



its a digital mechanical boost gauge from glowshiftdirect. Anyone have experience with these? I appreciate all the help so far.

 

I tapped into the green one for my power signal, but that's cause mine was totally analog with only lighting to be messed with.

Here's what they are for my 2009 Cobalt SS

PinK ---Ignition Voltage
GY ---Instrument Panel Lamps Dimming Signal
TaN ---Boost Gauge Signal
BlacK/WHite ---Ground

 

So pink is the positive and black/white is the ground? Shouldnt the gauge fire up if I have that connected? :/

 

EDIT* if you look at this http://www.glowshift.com/instruction...cuum-Gauge.pdf It shows a positive wire coming off the plug and a positive wire coming off the boost sensor. Is this where I went wrong?? Does the boost sensor and gauge have to both be connected to the positive for the gauge to turn on?

 

I guess what I am trying to say is, can I just wore the positive and negative to the factory gauge wires for power?

 

First hook up both of the black wires to a ground, for the gauge grab the one on the harness, for the sensor you can put a ring on it and use a bolt on the intake manifold or any grounded point.

Then you need to hook up both of the red wires to power, for the gauge I'd grab pink off the stock harness, as for the sensor find a switched source in the fuse box and make sure you put an inline fuse on it.

Take the green wire on the harness off of the new gauge and hook it to the white wire from the sensor.

The orange wire on the new gauge can get hooked to the GY wire for your lighting, you may want to put a resistor or a pot in that line so the gauge isn't blinding you. Ask radioshack for a adjustable resistor and describe what you're trying to do with it, they'll know what you're looking for. You may want to get a couple to see which one has the largest range of adjustability and return the rest. Use alligator clips to wire that pot in series with the gauge should look like this: GAUGE----POT----LIGHTINGPOWER

Any other questions please feel free to ask, I'd hate for you to burn out something.

Oh and to directly answer your question. Yes, you must have both the gauge and the sensor powered up to get a reading.

 

Wow!!! Thankyou so much for the information! I'll be doing this today, I'll let you know if I have any questions, THANKYOU!!!!

 

Could I tap the dimmer wire instead of using a resistor? I'm using the 3 gauge wiring harness glowshift supplied, tapped my pink and black/white for pos and neg off the stock boost gauge. The pink wire would be my switched pos source. And the black/white would be my ground for all my gauges. Then plan on running the constant from the battery to fusebox. And use an extra slot to fuse the constant. I did wire my gauges last night with only the pos and neg, fuel pressure lite up but wideband a/f did not. What would keep it from coming on? And would anyone recommend this set up? Solder, quick connects, or caps?

 

The method I described above was using the dimmer wire for lighting, if you're using an LED gauge you have to wire in a resistor to get the power down.