[Dave R]

Yes, I’m inclined to agree. Pull the gauges, post the date. Just seems odd that someone would swap a 6K tach in place of an 8k.

[unruhjonny]

it seems entirely plausible to me, especially if this one had the right price.
The 77-78 tach are almost dead ringers for the 70-76 8k tach - so most wouldn’t notice it as out of place.
Add to that, a 6k tach would be a direct swap for a non-functional factory 8k tach.

[Trevor78]

Not to mention an 8k rev range is generally of little use, originality aside.

[Brentco]

Originally Posted by Dave R

I was expecting a late date, not a super early one. Any chance it was changed at some point?

If it was changed it would have had to have been very early in the life of the car. Seems unlikely that a tach would need to be replaced so early, but not impossible.

The tach does not have a date code. The sticker must have come off at some point.

[Brentco]

Originally Posted by unruhjonny

i don’t believe that for one second..

Not sure why you’re taking the issue of the tach switchover date so personally, but you don’t have to be a dick about it.

[unruhjonny]

lol.

On occasion, someone comes here and swears till they are blue in the face that their car is 100% original in spite of a gap in the vehicle history;
If people like me don’t speak up, bad information spreads.

The hobby is better off when inaccuracies are called out for what they are.

[Brentco]

Originally Posted by unruhjonny

lol.

On occasion, someone comes here and swears till they are blue in the face that their car is 100% original in spite of a gap in the vehicle history;
If people like me don’t speak up, bad information spreads.

The hobby is better off when inaccuracies are called out for what they are.

Understood and agreed. I’m not trying to be dogmatic, and I’m not saying I’m 100% sure my tach is original. I acknowledge it’s possible it could have been replaced, but I’m just trying to weigh the facts and go where they lead me.

For this 6K tach to not be original, it would mean that 1) the original tach malfunctioned and had to be replaced in the first few years of the car’s life; 2) the dealership replaced it with the wrong tach from a different MY; and 3) there are typos in the official GM parts books and the entries that list the 6K tach as one of the tachs for 1976 are just incorrect. It’s not impossible that all these coincidences piled up, but to me the much simpler explanation is that the parts books mean what they say and the 6K tach came with my car originally.

I understand you’ve seen a lot of 76 trans ams, and every one one you’ve seen has had an 8k tach, but that doesn’t mean every 76 trans am had an 8k tach. Even if you’ve worked on 500 different 76 trans ams — an extremely high number — it would only be 1% of the 46k cars sold that year. A 1% sample is not enough to rule out the possibility that a subset of the production year was different.

Just trying to go off the best available evidence to, as you said, make sure we do our best to drill down to accurate information.

Personally, as much as I love Burt Reynolds, I’ll need more than Smokey and the Bandit deductions to convince me the parts books are wrong.

[Dave R]

Originally Posted by Trevor78

Not to mention an 8k rev range is generally of little use, originality aside.

As a teenager, I used my 8K Tach all the time 😁

[unruhjonny]

Originally Posted by Brentco

For this 6K tach to not be original, it would mean that:

1) the original tach malfunctioned and had to be replaced in the first few years of the car’s life

Which is an entirely plausible scenario.

Originally Posted by Brentco

2) the dealership replaced it with the wrong tach from a different MY

Now, is it possible that you're applying modern new vehicle warranties to a 1976 Pontiac?

I would suggest that more often than not if an OE part happened to fail outside of the limited warrantee period, that the parts would have NOT been changed at the dealership.

Originally Posted by Brentco

3) there are typos in the official GM parts books and the entries ...

Yes, and no, I am suggesting that you may have misunderstood how to occasionally interpret the information in a printed master parts catalog.

Originally Posted by Brentco

that list the 6K tach as one of the tachs for 1976 are just incorrect. ...

I will repeat what I posted earlier (with a small italiscized edit):

I have learned from people much more knowledgable than myself that the MPC’s sometimes have errors, and other times the stated year should not be taken as the model year, rather on occasion it implies calendar year.

I’d wager that second “76” listing is the ‘77 part

Does that make any more sense.

At the end of the day, if you want to leave a 6k tach in your car - just do it;
Just don't be put off when people looking at your car might feel obliged to point out that it's a post-1976 model year tach.
Because that's what I have been trying to say all along.

[Trevor78]

Let's not confuse model year with build-date. This also applies to parts, and is typically a very American issue to pass something off as newer or a dress size to be smaller than it actually is for sake of someone feeling better about it. I'd rather have the 6000 tacho, more needle movement ratio and my high winding 403 still doesn't need all of it LOL.

[unruhjonny]

except it’s a legitimate thing that GM DID in their master parts catalogs - and these typos were not fixed in subsequent printings.