GAUGES

[TRDmod]

are autometer gauges any good, has anyone here had problems with them?
because i need a couple of gauges, oil and water temp and i was looking at autometer as it is 50% cheaper than apexi gauges.

also do you knwo if auto meter gauges are electronic or mechanical?
which one is better or is it arguable??

[M R 2 Mk1]

Autometer are fairly reknowned for wrong readings like 10-15% off correct. The mechanical gauge versus Electronic gauge question, I will always use mechanical gauges because they give a direct reading and theres very little to go wrong, but in saying that when a pipe breaks off from your oil pressure gauge and hits hot oil onto your lap it cant be good

[TRDmod]

what!!?>!?!>!>!

thats huge inaccuracies.
if the engine temp is 80, thats 8-10 degrees, once you reach 100 lets say, or 110, thats more than 13 degrees difference

r u sure
if thats the case
they wouldnt be able to sell that equiptment

i was thinking of getting water temp and oil temp electronic

[gt4mike]

I had a few autometer ultralite gauges are found them to be pretty accurate - particularly the boost gauge since I had two other forms of measurement for that - blitz dual timer and apexi powerfc. All came very very close to each other.

I guess to me even though accuracy is nice, a gauge is more a point of reference... so you can look at your temp gauge and go.. hey thats higher than the normal point where it sits, or the boost gauge isnt normally at 540psi maybe something is wrong etc. The actual numerical readout imo isnt super critical for most street applications - whats more important is the reliability that it is actually going to show a difference. Mechanical gauges are nice and simple, but as its been stated its not that nice running oil lines into your cabin. If budget isnt an issue then I think electrical is better. There is more to go wrong, but its unlikely you will get a wrong reading - if something goes wrong it will probably turn off, read min or max which you could quickly figure out was something going wrong with the gauge.

[TRDmod]

Ok, well, cos I will be putting the car off the road kinda, and using it predominatly to run the engine over and on the track, not drag racing circuit, which is very strenuous on the engine constant high revs etc, engine will run hot. So I need to know what my temps are so I can regulate my driving and adjust according to the temp, now tell me if this is right

“the oil temp is put on a prob that’s already in a st205 apprenlty according to one shop, and will read the temp of the engine, …is that right, I thought they place the actual measuring devic eon the sump to measure how hot the oil is…:S or am I wrong….maybe I am because this is the first time I have looked into this…

now I will also be getting a after market air oil cooler.
Once I install oil cooler, would I expect bwetter cooling for the engine itself?

So to say, if I took my car in the circuit with out after market air oil cooler….take the average temp of oil and water, and I put in the oil cooler, would the temps of the oil and water drop down in average due to the oil cooler??

[FLAWLES]

i find tha splitfire gauges are very acurte and good vaule

[gt4mike]

Ok, well, cos I will be putting the car off the road kinda, and using it predominatly to run the engine over and on the track, not drag racing circuit, which is very strenuous on the engine constant high revs etc, engine will run hot. So I need to know what my temps are so I can regulate my driving and adjust according to the temp, now tell me if this is right

“the oil temp is put on a prob that’s already in a st205 apprenlty according to one shop, and will read the temp of the engine, …is that right, I thought they place the actual measuring devic eon the sump to measure how hot the oil is…:S or am I wrong….maybe I am because this is the first time I have looked into this…

now I will also be getting a after market air oil cooler.
Once I install oil cooler, would I expect bwetter cooling for the engine itself?

So to say, if I took my car in the circuit with out after market air oil cooler….take the average temp of oil and water, and I put in the oil cooler, would the temps of the oil and water drop down in average due to the oil cooler??

Does it really make much difference if the gauge is saying its 98deg and its actually 95deg? I don't think so.... You also need to bare in mind that its only measuring at one point in the engine, so some parts of the engine will have hotter water, so really you won't get an exact measurement anyway. If you are building a track car you should deal with the oil and water cooling systems so you can drive it to its potential without having to worry about the temps. If you are having to vary your driving style to try and keep the temps under control you won't be very competative. The temps should be easy to keep under control unless you are making absolutely huge hp figures.

I'm not sure what probe they would be talking about that you can remove on the 205. If you are putting in a cooler you would be better off putting the probe in the pipe heading to the cooler.

[FLAWLES]

this is true if you are placing a oil cooler on you can put the oil temp sender in the hose via a brass conecter you can also put the oil press unit on the same fitting

as for the in-acuriceys i have never nowin a gauge to be 10-15% out thats a big figure to be quoting i would say 1 to 2 psi or degrees out the only gauges that i have ever had probs with are boost gauges and yes autometer ones i know have splitfire ones they are wicked very nice indeed

[GT-R Glenn]

TRDMod
Try VDO gauges as imho they are better than autometer and are quite well priced , I put oil pressure / oil temp and water temp (elec) in my car and I think it was around just under $400 including the sender units etc:
The oil sender unit can go anywhere in the oil flow as it is telling you operating oil temp so unless you want a temp differential across the cooler it wont matter where it is.
Dont use a cooler thats too large either or you may need to blank off airflow on a cold day.

[FLAWLES]

bah thats the other one i was thinking of vdo

hell $400 dam thats cheep for vdo were did you get them from??????

[GT-R Glenn]

I got them from Wiri Auto Electrical

Bottom 3
I used to get the oil up to 125º pre fitting the oil cooler and now it never gets on the lower gauge unless you are caining it and it never gets over 100º
If it ever gets over 110º give it an oil change asap

[FLAWLES]

hey nice set up
you got them for a good price

i will try and post my set up tomorrow

[TRDmod]

so, better to get oil cooler and oil temp gauge at the same time so i can put the probe pre oil cooler pathway so i can measure the oil going ino the oil cooler....and if i want a difference reading, i would get two oil coolers, one before the cooler and one after the cooler....

when you say upgrade oil and water cooling, on a st205, it has an aluminium radiator....so after reaplacing the stock oil cooler, what else can i do, the riadiator is already quite large and efficient isnt it??

the oil pressure, shi t thats another one, what does the oil pressure do, i mean how do u read that?

[TRDmod]

oh yeah, and ....

i dont plan on putting huge horse power for now, i want to prep the car first for some power, so cooling is definately the way to go i think, thats why im asking about thsi stuff...

[bridgeport]

theres a bs light on the dash that comes on when the car drops oil pressure picture of an oil can anywhoo theres a pressure sender unit that it gets it signal from you can remove it and replace it with your sender or mechanical gauge its a good one to keep an eye on
because it could be the death of your engine especialy when you change the g forces acting on the car ie more power the oil can wash away from the pick up (read gtir)

peace

[TRDmod]

so oil pressure is simply how much oil you have in the car??
is that right?
to make sure you ahfe enough oil to lube every bit possible?

[FLAWLES]

no there cheif u got it all wrong oil press is when or how much oil your oil pump is pushing around the block you can tell by the geuge if u are running low by reading it ie cold you should be running 80 to 100psi and worm from 20 to 30 psi anything below 20psi i would check the oil level and if below 10psi turn the car off el pronto

[wde_bdy]

One good idea is to set up an idiot light for your oil pressure. There are various different pressure sensors available (if you know where to look) so you could set the light to come on at say 20psi so that you notice a pressure drop much qicker than with just a gauge (factory lights are usually lower or even 0 pressure switches, scary).
Lets face it, who has time to watch all their gauges when they are racing?
Even if you have the light set to 30psi and coming on at idle, it gives you an extra safety margin. At idle you can keep an eye on the gauge anyway.

Callum