Speedometer Cable "rattle"

I've noticed lately that my speedometer cable seems to have developed a slight noise - kind of a soft rattling sound - when I'm accelerating through about 23-25 mph.

The noise doesn't occur at lower speeds, nor at speeds above that, but pretty consistently happens in that approximate range. As best I can tell, the sound seems to emanate from behind the dash, from the part of the cable between the firewall and the speedometer.

I've tried moving the cable around in case maybe it was slightly kinked or something, but to no avail. Could a lack of sufficient lubrication within the cable be the problem? - and if so, what would be the best way to lube it? Or should I just replace the cable?

Maury

 

I have greased them in the past, but supposedly powdered graphite is the proper lubricant.
https://www.amazon.com/American-gre...p/B000K7TOLE/ref=sr_1_2?hvadid=77859220976724

 

Probably a little dry. I used to put a little graphite powder down the cable. I'd pull about 12" out from the speedo end, and puff some dust down the sheath as best I could, the spiral of the cable should pull it further down as you drive.
-Donny

 

Lube is good, you just don't want it sucked up into the instrument.

A worn inner cable may produce hairs of wire strands that snag and catch as it rotates.

I''d start by simply pulling the core and looking it over.

 

If all else fails you probably can get a replacement cable. I had to do that as the one that was on my Jeep when I got it was really bad.

 

Thanks very much for the help and advice, guys. I'll try re-lub'ing it and see how that goes. If that doesn't work, I'll just get a new cable. Will make another post here and report the results.

 

While looking at different ways to get graphite into a cable, I found this Youtube video where a guy used denatured alcohol as a carrier for the graphite:



A friend told me about a spray-can product called Lock-Ease he uses that similarly combines graphite with a rapidly evaporating "special carrier" (probably alcohol). As its name implies, it's designed for locks, but I thought that combined with the approach in the video above, it might work well in my speedometer cable. I found it on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000CIJUGA/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I put my rear axle up on jack stands, and put the Jeep in first gear at idle so that the disconnected speedometer cable rotated slowly.

Here are a couple of photos of the re-lub'ing process.

I found it easier to zip-tie the cable to my dash handle than to try to hold onto it:




I had to use one hand to take the photo, but when I sprayed the fluid into the cable, I used my left hand to cinch the paper towels around it so that they completely covered the end and the spray can "snorkel" tube. It's still kind of messy, but the bunched up paper towels helped greatly in minimizing any overspray.




I had to apply it in very small squirts, as otherwise the end fitting quickly filled up and overflowed before the fluid could make its way down into the cable. About 1/3 of the can was used in total.

I let it sit a day to give any carrier fluid remaining inside time to evaporate thoroughly. After re-installing the cable (then having to replace a burned wire that resulted from my not visually checking to see that the instrument light sockets were properly pressed into their positions on the speedometer housing: Shorted Wire - What Happened? ), I finally got to test the re-lub'ed cable this afternoon.

I am glad to say that after all the effort, the cable is nice and quiet now.

Thanks again for the help and advice!

Maury

 

This is the kind of stuff I have used..
Neolube 1, LUBRICANT - COLLOIDAL GRAPHITE IN ISOPROPANOL, MIL-L-24131C
I have also made my own when I needed to be sure only graphite and a known carrier and ONLY that carrier is involved out of powdered graphite and acetone. Preferably reagent grade acetone..