Yesterday the car was fine. Went to start it today and noticed smoke from the instrument cluster. After troubleshooting realized it came from the voltage limiter started the car and the fuel, oil, and water gauge did not work. Replace the limiter with another one and as soon as I went to start the smoke came back and burned that one up. What would cause this?

 

It is a 72 challenger

 

I would guess something is shorted. Time to pull the cluster and "get serious"

 

This is what I have now. If I leave the fuel, oil and water up the AMP gage flickers from center to charge. If I remove the water temp gauge from it the Amp gage is fine but both fuel and oil gauge go all the way up.

 

The amp gauge is completely separate from oil, temp, fuel. Those last three are powered by the limiter.

 

I know the ammeter is on its own wiring that is why its makes it weird.

 

I would guess it wasn't grounded proper. Had the same incident with my limiter. Ended up giving it its own ground direct to the firewall.

 

It was working just fine until the other night. Im waiting for one to come in. As far as trouble shooting it seems to be the temp gauge shorted it out. I put a new gauge in it and I don't have the amp gauge flickering anymore. Did you ground it from the mounting screw to the firewall?

 

I grounded mine via a pigtail to a bolt and screw through the column support. Main thing is that you do ground it.

 

replaced the voltage limiter and grounded it to the frame. Started the car and everything works great thanks for the help.