gauge cluster woes
 

i bought a 94 ford ranger the other day, i am pretty sure when we pushed it onto the trailer the gauges were working, well when i started it the other day the gauges were not working, would a close to dead battery be the culprit, or should i start checking fuses?

I'd go with fuses, sir. Unless you can't even start the engine, but I still think a gauge or two would move if you tried to start it. water temp or oil pressure.

well, the battery is pretty dead, jumping it off it will start, but without the jumper cables it won't, the battery is on the charger right now, and i am gonna head back out there in a little bit, which fuse number should it be? does anyone have a little diagram of which fuse is what? if you know what i mean

https://www.fleet.ford.com/maintenan...ls/results.asp

Maybe that would help. Just search 96 ford ranger.

well, i stuck the battery back in it, pretty much fully charged, and the speedo is the only gauge that works which is probably cable driven so that makes since, i guess when i get it home i will tinker around with the gauge cluster, right now it is stuck in my friends yard

ttt

Pull out the cluster and make sure all the wires on the back are good.

Failing that, either you have a bad cluster, bad wiring or all your sensors are bad (ordered most-likely to least likely, IMHO).

is it on the same circuit as the radio? it starts and runs good, it is missing the radio, and the oil pressure, fuel,gas, and volt gauges do not owrk

Have you checked all your fuses?

right after i wrote that, i went out there and started messing with it again, guess what he also took out fuse #7, it is fixed

Good to hear.

Larger question... why did he remove fuse #7?

?your guess is as good as mine,i guess he probably took it out when he took out the radio, thinking it might be the radio fuse, i'll look later today at it, and see if the actual fuse for the radio is in it