Electrical connection of new gauges

[HandyAndy]

Help please :o

I have bought an Oil Pressure gauge & Oil Temp gauge.......

bought the correct Sandwich plate thinghy & installed it correctly, installed the sender units etc into it.

Mounted my new gauges in the dash, they light up when side & dipped lights are turned on :cool:

However.....the instructions............3 connections to make

1) connect "S" direct to sender unit at oil filter end = done that
2) connect "-" to engine negative earth = done that
3) connect "+" to ignition live terminal = done that

The problem = the temp gauge isn,t reading a temp....
the pressure gauge goes off the scale

what am I missing? ( sorry if its obvious, me & electrickery just don,t mix :o )

cheers
andy

[RAYLEE29]

you havent got the sender wires crossed have you just a thought
Ray:)

[HandyAndy]

you havent got the sender wires crossed have you just a thought
Ray:)

I don,t think so....but knowing me & electrics then maybe :o

I purposely wired each one up at a time so as not to mix the wires.

Have I made a mistake with this ...... I,ve kept the original pressure sender that goes to the Sierra dash binnicle as I,d like to ensure that the oil pressure light goes out when the engine fires up.....could that cause a problem?

cheers
andy

[RAYLEE29]

ooh yes thatd be problem one the original oil pressure switch is just a switch the sender will change resistance according to pressure what you need to do is use a tee so you can fit the switch and the sender and wire both up as for the temp disconnect the wire and earth it to the block this should make the gauge read highest temp if not you have somat else wrong
Ray:)

[HandyAndy]

ok, thanks Ray, I,ll give that a try tomorrow .

cheers for your help.

Andy

[twinturbo]

I think you misunderstand Andy Ray, He has the preasure switch and a T-pice to the senders for the preasure and temp.

Perhaps these are back to front Andy?

TT

[mark]

My oil pressure goes off the scale when the oil is cold and thick, once it warms up its about 25psi idle and 80psi on the move

I thought i had it wired wrong when it initially went off the scale but i let it warm up to see what happened, maybe you need to do the same before you change any connections

Also oil temp guages take ages to get a reading as oil takes quite a while to warm up to temp, a good few miles of driving after the coolant temp is up to normal. It will prob take quite a while to get the oil temp up just revving it stationary compared to being under load when driving along

[HandyAndy]

He has the preasure switch and a T-pice to the senders for the preasure and temp.


TT

Erm....no, don,t have a T -piece to the senders, each gauge is directly wired to its own sender...

This is why I don,t understand what I,ve done wrong :confused:
as i,ve followed the instructions for each gauge independant of each other :confused:

cheers
andy

[HandyAndy]

My oil pressure goes off the scale when the oil is cold and thick, once it warms up its about 25psi idle and 80psi on the move

I thought i had it wired wrong when it initially went off the scale but i let it warm up to see what happened, maybe you need to do the same before you change any connections

Also oil temp guages take ages to get a reading as oil takes quite a while to warm up to temp, a good few miles of driving after the coolant temp is up to normal. It will prob take quite a while to get the oil temp up just revving it stationary compared to being under load when driving along

Ahh, now that makes me feel less thick :D

As it was pouring down, I kept the car in the garage when fitting the gauges, tho I did let it run up to temp ( coolant).

Hopefully if weather is kinder tomorrow I,ll have the car outside & will give it some welly .....stood still :rolleyes: :D

cheers
andy

[David_17]

Sounds like a bad earth to me Andy. I've got a water temp gauge that was having the same problems, all down to the earth on the sender.

[HandyAndy]

all down to the earth on the sender.

Hmmm, the senders I have don,t have an earth, the gauges have an earth & in the instructions it says " Direct to engine ground" from a terminal on the back of the gauge, which I have done :confused:

Now you can see why I had an auto electrician wire up the major part of my cars wiring :o

Tho, I had success yesterday....successfully wired in the reverse light, fog light & the fuel level gauge...all working as should be ..... I can now tell how much fuel I have ....yeehaa :D

cheers
andy

[twinturbo]

Erm....no, don,t have a T -piece to the senders, each gauge is directly wired to its own sender...

This is why I don,t understand what I,ve done wrong :confused:
as i,ve followed the instructions for each gauge independant of each other :confused:

cheers
andy



I don't mean an electrical t-pice, I mean a oil manifold.

TT

[twinturbo]

Hmmm, the senders I have don,t have an earth, the gauges have an earth & in the instructions it says " Direct to engine ground" from a terminal on the back of the gauge, which I have done :confused:

Now you can see why I had an auto electrician wire up the major part of my cars wiring :o

Tho, I had success yesterday....successfully wired in the reverse light, fog light & the fuel level gauge...all working as should be ..... I can now tell how much fuel I have ....yeehaa :D

cheers
andy


The block is your earth, so unless your ( t-pice, oil manifold, sandwich, whatever ) is an insulator then so long as your engine is earthed then the sender will be too.

TT

[HandyAndy]

The block is your earth, so unless your ( t-pice, oil manifold, sandwich, whatever ) is an insulator then so long as your engine is earthed then the sender will be too.

TT

all the sandwich plate has is an oil seal between it & the block face then the oil filter attaches to the sandwich plate with its own oil seal....

I don,t think I have the sandwich plate the wrong way around, as if I had it positioned with the oil seal on the outside then I imagine oil would/could seep from the 2 mating surfaces ? is that correct? :confused:

cheers for helping me out guys :cool:

andy

[twinturbo]

the thread should make contact anyway.

Which guages are they?

TT

[HandyAndy]

Which guages are they?

TT

This is the type of gauges I,ve fitted

item number on the bay 380252463408

& the sandwich plate is this 380252487013

cheers
andy

[twinturbo]

And you 100% have the preasure guage to the preasure sender and temp to the temp...


TT

[twinturbo]

nice price BTW

[HandyAndy]

And you 100% have the preasure guage to the preasure sender and temp to the temp...


TT

Well I thought I had :) now I,m thinking maybe I haven,t, will check tomorrow as the car is not at my home ( wish it was at times like this :o ).

Yes, the price is very good indeed, they do a full range of these gauges..
volts/oil temp/oil pressure/amps/water temp/boost etc, they look quite smart when lit up with an indigo blue colour , sandwich plate was ordered yesterday morning & was in my car before lunch time today, very good service :cool:

cheers
andy

[twinturbo]

temperature one should have a solid probe, preasure should have a small hole.

TT

[HandyAndy]

temperature one should have a solid probe, preasure should have a small hole.

TT

thats what I have, the temp one is like a small bullet, the pressure sender is a screw in thread with a tiny hole in the end, on the outside of the sandwich plate the pressure sender has a large body (size of the actual gauge) with the electrical screw on connector on it.

I,ll check the wiring from each sender tomorrow, if they are wired correctly then maybe its what "Mark" has suggested.

One of my winter mods will be a full new dash with these gauges & a bright 6 warning light setup & rev counter & speedo :cool:

cheers
andy

[HandyAndy]

Thanks for your help guys, :cool:

I had connected everything correctly :cool:

The problem was that the sandwich plate wasn,t earthing to the block/chassis, so I,ve ran an earth from the sandwich plate direct to the chassis & it all now works :cool:

Oil temp is showing a reading, tho can,t get it up to full temp as not allowed to drive it yet,
Oil pressure is showing between 25 to 30 at tickover & between 60 to 80 at high revs.

Yet again, this great forum came to the rescue , thanks everyone :)

cheers
andy

[David_17]

Glad you've got it sorted Andy, thought that's what it would be ;)