I'm looking to install a water temp gauge and oil pressure in my 89 5.0. Should I keep the stock water temp sender where it is and find a new place to put the new gauge sender and if so where should I put it or should I relocate the stock one and use the stock location of the new one and if so where should I put the stock one? Any help would be great. Thanks.
Water temp gauge install
- Thread starter tacoman
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Do you want your factory gauge to keep working? if so, you need to find a new place to boss in the new sending unit so you effectively have 2 sending units. If you don't care, you can do what I did and just remove the factory the factory sender and replace it with the new one. That renders the factory gauge off and useless (like it was any good before). 
millhouse
Founding Member
Take the stocker and relocate it to the hole on the lower intake closer to the firewall. Put the aftermarket unit where the stocker was for an accurate reading. Both will work...however the stocker will read very...very low temps in the more innacurate rear mounting location.
Keep in mind that the sender for the temp gauge is located on the drivers side front of the intake manifold. It is not connected to anything but the temp gauge, so disconnecting it won't hurt anything. The thermostat housing has a boss for a temp sender, but it may not be suitable for your gauge.
Don't mess with the sensor that is on the passerger side heater tube. That's the computer ECT sensor that is used to tell the computer how hot the engine is.
Don't mess with the sensor that is on the passerger side heater tube. That's the computer ECT sensor that is used to tell the computer how hot the engine is.
onefstsnake
New Member
As for the oil sender you can just use a brass Tee to hook it up to the stock sender.
Are you using Mechanical or Electric gauges?
Are you using Mechanical or Electric gauges?
There is another sender that goes to the ECU, the one at the front of the intake by the water neck is ONLY for that dash gauge as jrichker said. Good call on the guage though, the factory one sucks a fat one.
Jrichker's post (and the others that followed) can ease your mind about the gauge's sending unit.
For the fox, I did mine like Millhouse did. On the '94, I spent 10 bucks at AZ for a new stat housing with the 3/8" boss already in place. On the 94 I chose to put the aftermarket gauge's sender in the stock-sending unit location because if my stat stuck closed, the sending unit in the stat-housing might not reflect motor temps (for a high quality stat like Kevin uses, it likely matters-not). Then I relo'd the stock sender and extended the wiring to the t-stat housing.
However, for a fox, Millhouse's method works well if your intake has that dead port. You can remove that dead-plug without removing the plenum. As he said, coolant flow back there kinda sucks (the gauge tends to reflect temps more radiantly), but the sending location accuracy and gauge accuracy are fairly matched.
For the OP, you will probably have to piece together some brass fittings from the Home store if you want to keep both senders. Knowing that the stock sending unit is 1/4" NPT and most aftermarket E-senders are 1/8" NPT can be helpful.
Good luck.
For the fox, I did mine like Millhouse did. On the '94, I spent 10 bucks at AZ for a new stat housing with the 3/8" boss already in place. On the 94 I chose to put the aftermarket gauge's sender in the stock-sending unit location because if my stat stuck closed, the sending unit in the stat-housing might not reflect motor temps (for a high quality stat like Kevin uses, it likely matters-not). Then I relo'd the stock sender and extended the wiring to the t-stat housing.
However, for a fox, Millhouse's method works well if your intake has that dead port. You can remove that dead-plug without removing the plenum. As he said, coolant flow back there kinda sucks (the gauge tends to reflect temps more radiantly), but the sending location accuracy and gauge accuracy are fairly matched.
For the OP, you will probably have to piece together some brass fittings from the Home store if you want to keep both senders. Knowing that the stock sending unit is 1/4" NPT and most aftermarket E-senders are 1/8" NPT can be helpful.
Good luck.
smellmygas
Member
Kevin, I agree. With what I know of fluid dynamics, this is true for all temp gauge sending units. Just to ease confusion, we are talkin about temperature gauges - not pressure gauges.
Teeing a deadhead (like the stock coolant sending unit location) is not a good idea (it becoming a radiantly-heated alcove, like Kevin wisely noted).
As an aside, if someone has a temperature line that is being cut and tee'd into (not unlike an AM manifold block) for one sending unit, then that would work because the probe is suscepted to the flow of fluid (this is normally used for trans fluid temp gauges). The stock water temp sending location is not one such application however.
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