300SDL Wrong Instrument Cluster Readings

[Abadjay]

I have a 1987 300SDL that I was working on over the past few weeks of May. I challenged myself to take out the dashboard and to replace the vacuum pods that would ensure that the A/C will blow in all the right places. It was mildly successful (vacuum takes a while to build up and fully pull the insides of the pod). However, I realized that upon putting my instrument cluster back in, it was reading that I had a full tank, overheating, and had no oil pressure...

When I was first removing the instrument cluster I had failed to the remove the battery first and upon taking it out, I noticed a smell of something "burnt" (possibly a short?) followed by smoke, but didn't bother to check it out because I had already removed the A-pillars, speakers, etc and didn't want to go backwards in my progress towards dash removal.

Situation now: I seem to have found a "sweet spot". This means that when I put the instrument cluster in just the right place, it seems to read normally... but I would rather have it so that I can place the instrument cluster all the way in and not have to worry about it falling out. Here's a video of what I mean.

300SDL Instrument Cluster Failure - YouTube

I assume that the easiest solution may be to get a non-malfunctioning instrument cluster, but perhaps there is an easier solution out there???

What do you guys think?