96 Tahoe Speedometer

Just picked up a 96' Tahoe from a neighbor who was parting with it because it is a "gas hog." Thing didn't even have 100,000 miles on it yet and was well taken care of.

I was driving the other day with my wife pacing behind me when I noticed I was getting passed a lot, and according to the speedometer I was doing about 75. Hmm. I called the wife on her cell phone and she said we were going 70.

Do you think this is a problem with the speedometer itself or is it something else in the rig? Tire size is normal 245/75/R16 so its not the tires.

It also hard shifts a little between first and second but not horribly. I am going to change out the tranny fluid and filter along with a full tune-up to see if this improves. Otherwise a great vehicle.

Sometimes after a while in cars the speedometer will "lose track" with the tires in the vehicle. If you take it to your nearest wheel/tire place they should be able to help you out, mine has 145,000 miles on it and I always make sure to check when going buy a radar trailer, and have had the speedometer fixed once for the same problem. As far as the transmission changing the fluid and filter should help, but mine does that now, and I found out that the transmission is on its last legs, but with 100,000 miles you should be ok. Good luck, the truck will last you a LONG time if you take care of it properly, and I dont think they are really gas hogs, but everyone has their own opinion.

Thanks for the info!

I don't think its any worse gas wise than other trucks/vehicles out there. We own a Blazer that I think is worse on gas or gets the same mileage as this Tahoe does; you get a lot more truck for the same amount of gas mileage with the Tahoe.

This weekend is going to be filter/fluid weekend. I'm getting everything cleaned up and tuned up. I will have to run it up the road to get the speedo looked at.

1) Speedo - You have a stepper motor going bad. Pretty common and easy to fix. Back side of the instrument cluster has one of these motors for each guage. A little bit of solder and soldering iron/ $6.50 worth of parts/ half an hour worth of work.
2) Tranny - +1 on fluid/ filter change.

John