water temp gauge

[rollaholic]

okay so my factory water temp gauge doesnt work. i repaired the crappy wiring and replaced the sensor, but it constantly reads red hot. im thinking the dash is damaged, maybe a blown diode or something?

anyway, i figured it would be easier to just put an aftermarket gauge in. it seems like you can get gauges for cheap, but when you add in the cost of a sensor and the fitting you put into the radiator hose, it adds up pretty quickly. so what i wanted to know was - is it possible to connect it up to the factory sensor? anyone know?

cheers

[Rick]

I just got a temp guage and sender the other day for my car, replaced the factory sender with the aftermaket one as I couldnt find any info on the resistance range of the factory one (however you could measure the factory one with an ohm meter starting from cold all the way to hot, to get the range) I couldnt be bothered and thought it would be a good excuse to replace the 18 year old sender, all up $100. You could also look at replacing the factory dash guage with another one.

[rollaholic]

did you have to get a specific gauge to match the sender to the thread on your housing? or was it a standard type thing

[Rick]

Yes the guage has to match the sender, I think they do it that way so you have to buy there sender, the sender comes in a varitary of thread types, my smallport 4agze is a M16x1.5 thread.