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Old 12-02-2002, 09:40 AM
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Mr.Fixit Mr.Fixit is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: so cal, Cal
Cobra Make, Engine: I used to fix them for a living
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Mechanical temp gauges do use a capillary tube. Fuel level, by nature, needs to be an electrical gauge, but it's a relatively unimportant gauge anyway, same for the ammeter or voltmeter. I just don't want to trust the important things like oil pressure and temp to a gauge that needs voltage to work right. Mechanical oil pressure gauges sweep quicker than the electrical counterparts, so long as the pressure line is -3 or -4 with full sweep elbow fittings. Maybe I am superstitious or just biased, but there are more things that can go wrong with an electrical oil pressure gauge setup than a mechanical one, and still appear to be fine. If the impedence of the sender wire changes, the connector loosens slightly, you have a charging problem and the volts go out of the range of what the gauge prefers, the sender/transducer goes out of calibration, etc. I have replaced only a couple of faulty mechanical oil pressure gauges in my life, but dozens of electrical gauge senders and gauges. My oil pressure gauge needle move more quickly than my tach needle. Electric speedo's are nice however.
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In a fit of 16 year old genius, I looked down through the carb while cranking it to see if fuel was flowing, and it was. Flowing straight up in a vapor cloud, around my head, on fire.
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