Replacement Instrument Cluster question

[rcoville]

Greets to all:

I have an 83 GS1100 ES. At some point in its life, it developed a crack and a couple of other minor issues. I am contemplating replacing it this fall / winter. One important item to note: this bike does NOT use a driven tachometer gear. The tacho has a connector and wire lead.

Are there instrument clusters from other GS models that will fit this bike? Did other models share the same cluster?
Are there other options you know of that I could explore?

Thanks.
Rick

[TheCafeKid]

When I cracked up my 1100ES this past spring, there was only a minor amount of damage. Unfortunately the damaged bits were either the most expensive ones still available, or completely unobtainable. One of which was the gauge cluster. Completely destroyed however a tach from any GS700/750 from 83 on is a comparable replacement. It's not exactly the same, it has less "dummy" lights and the gear position indicator is sequential, backlight numbers instead of an LCD display like ours. But it plugs right in and functions properly.
If you do pull your gauges, save as many of the bits as possible. The tach board inside esspecially. Over the years the capacitors start to dry out and the tachs get goofy. Changing the board out is simple, and if your tach reads good and your new gauges don't, simply swap the chip board. Btw the chipsets seems to be propritary, though some people were working on possibly replacing them with modern available chips/resistors and caps.