Speedometer Display Tech

[atteSmythe]

A bit of an odd question, maybe, but I'm curious - does anyone know exactly what kind of display is used for the speedometer readout?

The information display is clearly backlit LCD (a very well-designed one, but you can see the backlighting under certain circumstances). The information icons are uniformly a light shining through a cutout, no mystery there (although interesting that the one for the brights, above the speedo, is of a different tech than the speedo itself).

However, I was surprised today when the sunlight hit my car just right so as to defeat all the shrouding around the speedo display, that when it shone down in there and I could see the structure of what is usually hidden in darkness, I could still not see the outline of the characters on the display, like you would expect to see from an LCD display.

Is it something different, or was the light just not hitting at quite the right angle to show the outlines of the inactive character segments?

[dripkit]

Been wondering this ever since I bought my car... the speedo seems to just float in front of the black circle - I suspect it's some kind of mirror and the screen itself is actually above the tach, but that's just a guess.

[sirjonsnow]

It's coming from the above, if you look you can see the circle where it's projected from.

[Cam720]

Correct comes from above. Image is shot onto a 1 way mirror with the reflection facing forward. Readout is displayed on a circular piece of plastic with a stem that mounts with 1 screw thru the rear of the cluster. I took my entire cluster apart to see if there was a resistive flasher for the turn signals. If there had been I could have installed a solid state one for the led turn signals I want without adding the resistors at the light needed. Flasher is internal within the ecu, not cluster. Cluster has a speaker to make the sound you hear turning.

[atteSmythe]

Ah, interesting. I'd assumed it was a lens in front of a display that made it 'float,' but I think I can see where projecting it would be the better option. That probably makes LED a bit more likely than LCD.

Those displays are all gorgeous, it's clear a lot of work went into them. And despite looking like they used different tech for each of the speedo, instantaneous fuel mileage, and multipurpose displays, the color match on the white is really quite good. That's tough to do!

Thanks guys. If you stumble on any other neat tidbits regarding the displays, I'd be really curious to hear about them.

[Kenny Carwash]

I don't know much about these things, but I noticed that if I put my head right up against the window it's possible to see the number in the surrounding blue colour, without the black part in the way. I concluded that the black disc must be polarised in a way that blocks out the blue (or green, or red) but lets the white light of the numbers through.

As an aside, I really wish Honda had incorporated some sort of brightness adjuster for the dash, the bright blue parts in particular. I find it can be a bit wearing while driving at night. I had a Citroen with a similar digital display array and there was a 'Dark Mode' button that turned all the dash lights off except just kept the speed and fuel level displayed.

[chaos]

Interesting.

[Gitano]

There is a brightness adjuster for the dash. It is located just to the right of the speedometer housing. It may be difficult to see it from your seat as the steering wheel may block your view, but there is a thin long knob that will change the brightness of the dash lights.

[Kenny Carwash]

Ah, thanks. I'll have a look for that on my way home.

[wizkid057]

All very interesting.

I want to add that I've noticed that all of the displays are still perfectly readable in direct sunlight, which is pretty impressive. I wouldn't mind getting a hold of one of the displays used in the MID for a misc project.