Sticky Odometer and Trip Odometer finally fixed on my FZJ80 (1 Viewer)

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Joined
Jul 27, 2011
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Location
Evensville, TN
I bought my first Toyota Land Cruiser, well first Toyota really, about a year ago. I have had a few little things that have bugged me on and off sense I've bought it. I guess little problems are to be expected in a vehicle with 281,000 miles. Today I tackled the P0402 code (fixed it but I've given myself a P0401 now) and a sticky odometer/trip odometer. I was told that the odometer would stick when I bought the truck. I was also told that a quick push of the trip reset plunger would take care of the problem. At first the odometer would stick about every 100-200 miles. Here recently I noticed that it was sticking every time I would roll to 19.9 miles on the trip odometer. So I had an idea where to start looking. I just needed to get my hands on the trip odometer.

There are a few threads out there for the removal of the instrument cluster, so I won't bother you with the photos of that. Once you have finagled the cluster out of the dash. you will need to split the cluster so that you can get your hands on the odometer dials. Here are a few photos of the disassembly and the problem I found.

There are 9 clips that will need to be depressed in order to separate the two pieces of the cluster. On the back of the cluster are 4 screws holding the speedometer gauge in the housing. This will allow the removal of the speedometer/odometer gauge from the housing.

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I had to then take the speedometer needle off and the screws on either side of the needle. This will allow the gauge face to come off granting access to the internals. Use two spoons on opposing sides of the needle and apply light force to the handles of the spoon. The needle should come off easy. Be careful as the pin that the needle is on is very fragile.

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Now I had access to the trip dials and the internals. Be carful once the face is off due to the fragile nature of the wiring behind the gauge face. Next was to separate the trip odometer from the odometer and speedometer. This is done by holding two clips on either side of the assembly and lightly pulling up while you hold the clips together.

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Now that they are separated I was able to clean the gears and inspect them for damage. I did not find any broken gears or anything visible blocking the drive motor preventing rotation. I checked this by unscrewing the two screws holding the motor to the board. Then positioned the motor in a way that would allow me to turn it without the worm gear being in contact with the drive gears. I then focused my attention on the trip odometer. I held the reset plunger in allowing me to rotate the barrel of numbers noticing that every time I passed the 9.9, 19.9 29.9, 39.9....... it would have resistance. I exercised the dials for about 2 minutes and noticed that I had black foam falling out of the gears as I would spin them. I then hit it with some compressed air and found a piece of foam had come dislodged from the gears. I was able to pull it out and now the barrel rotated freely. looking around I found the culprit! It was the dust seal on the reset plunger . It appears it had degraded and a peace of the foam had found its way into the tens position of the trip odometer. Every time the dial would try to rotate 10s,20s,30s....... it would create enough resistance that the motor could not over come it anymore.

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Now off to chase the P0401 code..........
 
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Wow, thanks for the detailed write up! I need to fix my trip odometer and this will give me a good reference to work from. Being an old fart, my hands shake more than they used to and the eyes aren't quite as sharp, but I'd like to have my trip meter back. Put this on the list of things to fix. After it gets a little warmer outside. Good luck with the P0401!
 
One thing to remember when putting the speedometer needle back on, make sure that you do not press the needle to far onto the pin. This will cause friction between the gauge face and needle body, not allowing the needle to "spring return" to 0mph. You should be able to raise the needle and it fall smoothly back to 0mph.
 
My trip odometer has a broken piece of plastic that the reset button connects to. I have tried to use plastic epoxy to repair it a few times and it continues to break.. Any idea where I could find just the trip odometer to replace? It really is annoying not to have it.. And thanks for the great write up..
 
My trip odometer has a broken piece of plastic that the reset button connects to. I have tried to use plastic epoxy to repair it a few times and it continues to break.. Any idea where I could find just the trip odometer to replace? It really is annoying not to have it.. And thanks for the great write up..

I would find someone who is parting out their LC here on the Classifieds. Or if you are on Facebook you can join a Local/US LC club/group page. Here in the South East we have a few good pages with plenty of helpful people that would ship you a Speedometer.
 
My trip odometer has a broken piece of plastic that the reset button connects to. I have tried to use plastic epoxy to repair it a few times and it continues to break.. Any idea where I could find just the trip odometer to replace? It really is annoying not to have it.. And thanks for the great write up..

Mine did the same thing and I had to end up buying a full cluster to pull the unit from.
 
Thank you for the specific pictures on removing the needle!

I just pulled apart the spare I bought and found where the trip ODO was also broken. I'll post more after I get another.
 
couldn't get the needle off on mine and didn't want to break it
 
would your main odometer quit at the same time as your trip odometer whenever it was acting up?
 
No main odometer is fine, just the trip that's been screwy for a few years
 
shoot. Mine go out and come back intermittently, but they do it together. Probably a different problem.
 
Doing this now, as my trip meter started acting up a couple days ago. The reset plunger has always seemed like it needed to be checked out, and I found the piece connecting it to the gearset is broken. Ultimately it still works (kinda), but it’s caused a loose connection, and doesn’t turn the gears properly unless I hold everything the right way. I did have a small amount of sticking in the gears, and the connection was finally weak enough to not turn them well. I blew everything out as I cycled them, and now they turn freely & function normally, as long as the first white gear is making enough contact - but that’s the issue with the broken piece.

Foam seal was intact but easily broke apart, so I removed it. Replacing with a tiny bit of weatherstripping foam.

Going to try superglue on the broken bit, but if it doesn’t last (I expect it not to), guess I’ll try to find a used part. Anyone happen to know if one can be used from a different vehicle?

The whole assembly is pretty intuitive and easy to deal with, but your post helped avoid any guesswork.

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Looks like it’s fixed, but we’ll see how long the glue holds. Sure not paying the prices I’m finding for used clusters just to get the part, which could also be broken.

[Edit: see post 25 for results]
Does anyone know where to accurately reinstall the needle? You’d think it’s just at zero, against the stopper, but if you lift the needle over the stopper on the tac for example, the spring continues to “return“ until about 6 o’clock. Unfortunately there’s no “key“ as far as I can tell. Thought I goofed a connection when reinstalling, but once I hit ~40, needle started moving. Ideally don’t want to have to take everything apart a bunch. Scangauge is still on point & GPS agrees, so at least no pressure.
 
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I fixed mine and don’t remember doing anything special to put the needle back on

Let me look when I get home to see if I have the part that is broken on yours. If it is intact you can have it. Don’t remember as I replaced the entire trip meter so didn’t do much with the part I took out

John
 
Thank you sir - appreciate that & generous of you, whether you end up having it or not.

I became curious when I saw the needle assembly didn’t appear to have a key/etc, so I’m sure I’m just missing something simple.
 
I fixed mine by gluing the cracked plastic piece back together. I decided not to fully disassemble the thing do to the complexity of the unit and glued it in place. The one other step step I took was to add a small piece of aluminum to limit the travel of the reset button. This should limit the stress on the glued piece if someone jams the reset button hard.
 
Nice, I need to fix my trip odo as it is getting stuck around the same position.
 

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