A fellow Canadian poncho member brought me his car and asked me to install an aftermarket cruise control in it. You may recognize the car as a previous feature car.
He had a brand new cruise control kit in the box. It's a Speedostat unit.
I've installed some GM Cruise kits over the years but never an after-market one. It was kind of a fun challenge but it did turn out to be a challenge. More on that later. I thought maybe we should do a write-up on it here in case anyone else is doing one like this or wants to do one like this.
The cruise unit basically consists of a vacuum operated servo with a pull cable on it, control module, a switch to release the cruise control when you step on the brake pedal, driveshaft magnets and a sensor on the drive shaft to create a speed signal.
I began by mounting the speed sensor and the magnets on the drive shaft and running the wire harness from there up to the engine compartment.
After that I mounted the servo on the inner fender. The manual suggested mounting the servo on the back of the cylinder head or on the firewall but I don't like that way. It clutters that area up so much around the distributor. The instructions didn't show a servo cable in the box but there was one in there. Because the manual wasn't showing a cable it took a while for me to figure out how it attached. I needed to drill a hole, add a screw and once I did it all made sense. To me it makes a much neater installation with the servo on the inner fender and the cable running around to the carburetor..
With the servo mounted and the sensor mounted I needed to find a place for the module. I know it goes under the dash but I didn't like the idea of drilling holes in his firewall. Thankfully the 68 has a 2" hole with a plastic plug-in it down below the brake booster beside the steering column. It was perfect. I took that plug out, drilled the hole in it for the rubber grommet that's included in the kit and installed it. This grommet carries the electrical harness as well as a vacuum hose.
If there's one thing I'm not impressed with in this kit it's the release switch that goes on the brake pedal. It seems like a rather Mickey Mouse setup. It uses a little pull chain on a small switch. Since I've installed the kit I now read online where somebody used the idea of the power from the stop light switch to run a relay to turn off the cruise when you step on the brake instead.
When I went out for a road test I initially smiled because I first locked it in at 45 miles per hour and it worked fine with some minor adjustments which are explained in the manual. However when I took it up to 60 miles an hour and tried to engage it the speed dropped off to about 45 and locked in there. That left me with a big question mark on my face. As much as I tried with adjustments I could not make it engage higher than about 52 miles per hour maximum. Back to the drawing board!
Carl owns the 68. He and I talked and emailed back and forth with all kinds of possibilities of what could be wrong. We knew the manual that I had used that came with the kit was for a similar kit and thought it would be correct. However he had a another manual for a similar kit and looking in there it said that rear wheel drive vehicles use one magnet for the sensor instead of two that the first manual described. The more we discussed it, the more I thought about, it the more it made sense that the module was not able to process the volume of pulses it was receiving from the sensor. With two magnets on the drive shaft the pulse count is double. Because the cruise has a top speed limiter and will not let you set it above a certain miles per hour it made sense. The most I could get out of it was about 52 miles per hour with two magnets which would be 104 miles per hour with one magnet. That all made sense. So today I took one magnet off. The road test went perfect. Went up to 70 miles per hour, pushed the set button and it locked in perfectly at 70. Victory!
Carl needs to be careful... He might have a new case of option itis.
I wanted to do it in case anyone did one of these kits and puts two magnets on the driveshaft (the kit has 2 in the box). It has literally consumed my thinking time for days now trying to figure out why the heck it works perfect but only up to 52 mph! I may take some more detailed pictures and add them later.
I told Jake ( he actually goes by "Carl" ) that I was glad he was the guinea pig for this! I may try to put one on my 66 if I can figure out a way to hide the servo and the lever. I've read a ton about these kits trying to figure out what was wrong with it and most guys say they've had them for years and the only thing that ever goes wrong is the magnets coming loose.
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
There was a bit of irony to this whole ordeal sorting this out. We were both searching for info online, and I found this in a thread on a Chevy van forum. It's a 15 year old post, Dec 2004! Notice what I bolded----
12-30-2004, 02:27 AM
GraphikWerks,
Don't worry about brake pedal incompatibility. I installed several of those Dana cruise controls on my cars and never used that cheesy brake pedal switch.
Instead, go to Radio shack and get a 12 volt relay. Wire the coil to the brake light switch and ground and use the normally closed contacts of the relay in place of that pedal switch. Works like a charm.
The one with the built-in vacuum pump seems to work better on smaller engines than the one that uses intake vacuum. I installed one of those on a 65 Corvair. I mounted the servo unit in the engine compartment and extended the wires to reach the turn signal lever. I spent the extra money for the replacement turn signal lever and it looked almost factory.
Carl,
Maybe your Audiovox cruise control has a limited top speed because you have too many magnets on your drive shaft. Try taking half of them off.
[This message has been edited by dieselvan (edited December 30, 2004).]
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
I am really looking forward to driving the Grande back and forth to Morden next year. Its about a 120 km drive from Wpg and it is going to be real nice having the cruise. The big block cruiser will be ready to hit the highway next year with a Speedostat cruise, a 3 1/8 turn Saginaw steering box, new front suspension bushings, a Rosenort Motors wheel alignment and some fancy wheels!
I installed a mid 70's Simpson Sears cruise control in my 65 several years ago and was surprised to find that it still works. The magnet was missing so I used a one that I already had and set the sensor depth per instructions, worked fine. There were several adjustments for the low and high speed settings as well as the sensitivity but after some fine tuning, it does the job. So I would think that only one magnet is needed.
I also installed those kits when I worked at CTC in the early 80s. The two magnets are used on front wheel drive cars on the drive axle. Two are needed because the axle rotates slower than a driveshaft in a rear wheel drive car.
Here's a link to a thread where these cruise unit were discussed previously.
I haven't taken a look at the links that Greaser provided, but I'm curious if they show the cable installation.
Good eye seventy2plus2, ...yes indeed, this Speedostat system originates from your parts inventory!
I can't wait to test the new system out but Carl won't release the Grande from his Morris service shop! I am hoping to get the car back sometime before spring, lol. (I am kidding!)
But I am not kidding about being excited to have cruise as I am not used to driving a car with my foot constantly stuck to the gas pedal. Funny how it was no big deal back in the day but now we are so used to having and using cruise control in today's vehicles.
-- Edited by 68 Grande on Friday 18th of October 2019 08:13:44 PM
Good eye seventy2plus2, ...yes indeed, this Speedostat system originates from your parts inventory!
I can't wait to test the new system out but Carl won't release the Grande from his Morris service shop! I am hoping to get the car back sometime before spring, lol. (I am kidding!)
But I am not kidding about being excited to have cruise as I am not used to driving a car with my foot constantly stuck to the gas pedal. Funny how it was no big deal back in the day but now we are so used to having and using cruise control in today's vehicles.
-- Edited by 68 Grande on Friday 18th of October 2019 08:13:44 PM
Just a warning to you guys, this guy 68_Grande is a bad bad influence...... He gets me to put a cruise kit in his car. I really really like it now that I got it working. So I couldn't help myself. This showed up at my parcel pickup depot at the border yesterday and I went and picked it up today. Now I have to figure out how to hide as much of it as I can on my "original" car...
And I just noticed the left over roast beef and carrots in the picture...that was NOT included with the cruise kit!
"""Carl owns the 68. He and I talked and emailed back and forth with all kinds of possibilities of what could be wrong. We knew the manual that I had used that came with the kit was for a similar kit and thought it would be correct. However he had a another manual for a similar kit and looking in there it said that rear wheel drive vehicles use one magnet for the sensor instead of two that the first manual described. The more we discussed it, the more I thought about, it the more it made sense that the module was not able to process the volume of pulses it was receiving from the sensor. With two magnets on the drive shaft the pulse count is double. Because the cruise has a top speed limiter and will not let you set it above a certain miles per hour it made sense. The most I could get out of it was about 52 miles per hour with two magnets which would be 104 miles per hour with one magnet. That all made sense. So today I took one magnet off. The road test went perfect. Went up to 70 miles per hour, pushed the set button and it locked in perfectly at 70. Victory!"""
And there's a couple of other differences too. His kit has the yellow control module, mine has the black module. His kit has no provision for a deceleration switch (cruise kicks off in the event of a very hard stop via mercury switch) and my kit has one. His kit came with a cable permitting the servo to be mounted on away from the engine, mine has no cable, just a short wire out of the servo where the short chain hooks on.
I like the idea of using a cable and mounting the servo remotely (maybe try to hide it somewhere on my car) so I may buy a cable and add it.
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
I just drove his car home to Winnipeg (about 35 minutes of highway driving). I am VERY impressed with this cruise unit. There's a stretch of the highway that is fresh, perfectly flat prairie, perfectly smooth highway. I set the cruise at exactly 60 mph to try it and the needle never moved enough off the white 60 mark on the speedometer to let me see the entire white line. At most it dropped about 1/2 a mile per hour. I pulled over a couple of times and when I pulled back on and hit "resume" it went back to exactly 60. I'm sold on these units. I think there will be one going into my car if I can figure out a way to hide the servo.
On a side note I somehow managed to pull apart a connector on his wiring harness that is from the alternator and when the car was shut off in his garage it wouldn't even crank. Not happy with myself for that one...
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
I saw this kit on ebay this morning. I don't know how many of you guys are familiar with the Dana kits but this one seems to be unique. I've never seen a control module or servo like this one. Most of the kit is identical to the one I installed on Carl's Grande Parisienne but those two pieces are nothing like the others.
I saw this kit on ebay this morning. I don't know how many of you guys are familiar with the Dana kits but this one seems to be unique. I've never seen a control module or servo like this one. Most of the kit is identical to the one I installed on Carl's Grande Parisienne but those two pieces are nothing like the others.
Price is right at $45, but I haven't seen one with this type of module. So far I have seen the yellow module, a black module and a blue module similar in size to the yellow. But this seems to be different altogether.
It appears the module is also the switch to operate it. I think you are supposed to hang it under the dash and you reach down to set the cruise. That seems awful inconvenient. Great price though.
The wiring harness, the sensor, the brake pedal switch are all the same as in the other kits.
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
I just picked up my 3rd kit at the border. I want to install one, have a spare on the shelf and the third one was too cheap to just let someone else have it, I had to grab it!
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
I think there will be one going into my car if I can figure out a way to hide the servo.
Not happy with myself for that one...