I was wondering if anyone knew the best way to test an oil temp gauge on a 1965 1800? I took it out of a dead 1800 and want to test it. The water temp gauge registered when the sending unit is put into hot water but I can't get the oil temp gauge to register. I don't think the water is hot enough. I also noticed that the sending unit part of the oil temp gauge, the part that screws into or above the oil pan is kinda loose. I want to get it working, any suggestions on a test or repair? Thank You!

Thanks for all of your input. I like the repair page Dave. Hopefully we can find a long enough tube on a doner gauge since the oil temp gauge has a long copper wire. Looks like an interesting experiment. It doesn't mention anything about the nut that holds the bulb in the side of the oil pan. I also read never open the back of these gauges since it can break the tabs that hold them together.

I have a couple of sets of bad ones, I was looking around for a fix and found this.

http://www.ply33.com/Repair/tempgauge.html

It seems to be a not too hard fix, haven't had time yet to take a shot at it.
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Dave Shannon
Spring Valley, California
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Thank You for the suggestion. Actually, the wires seem sufficient, its the bulb on the end that is loose on the oil temp sender. Their must be a way to repair it with solder or something. If anyome ever fixed their own please let me know. For now I'm going to keep searching for repiar info, $180.00 is out of my ballpark. mgc67@hotmail.com thank you!

If the bulb is loose you have lost the ether charge so soldering alone
won't help. It is also kinda hard to solder with ether in it because
the heat from soldering boils all the ether out (and maybe catches it on
fire, since it is highly volatile and combustible). What you have to do is
fix all the broken places, take it loose near the instrument, fill it with
ether down in the bulb, keep the bulb very cold while you solder the
tube up at the instrument. Then, if you did it right, it will probably work
OK.

If the bulb is loose you have lost the ether charge so soldering alone
won't help. It is also kinda hard to solder with ether in it because
the heat from soldering boils all the ether out (and maybe catches it on
fire, since it is highly volatile and combustible). What you have to do is
fix all the broken places, take it loose near the instrument, fill it with
ether down in the bulb, keep the bulb very cold while you solder the
tube up at the instrument. Then, if you did it right, it will probably work
OK.

The steel based capillary tubes on those gauges always get brittle and crack and 90% of the time it's the oil temp one that goes first because the tube is longer and probably more exposed to potential danger.

There's a place called MoMo or MoMar in New Mexico that repairs them. They charge about $185 USD and for that they will replace both capillary tubes with better more robust and flexible copper based lines and calibrate both gauges. They won't repair just one gauge because the chances are the old one will crack when being packed for shipping or when being installed.

Roj

'67 1800S

It's Margaret Lucas at MOMA Engineering in... ummm... Albuquerque, NM.

Went to local speedo repair shop a few days back, to see what they do when they rebuild VDO speedos. During my visit, they mentioned how they repair all types of gauges; the temp gauge repair was approximately $95, which included filling up with ether and installing stronger capillary tube. Have no idea about oil temp repair prices however.

Are there any speedometer or instrument repair facilities in your area you can check out? Maybe try a google search?

The oil temp gauge starts at 140 F., so you should definitely see a reading if you put the sender in near-boiling water. Should work exactly the same as the water temp gauge.

Not sure what you mean by kinda loose, but if you can move the bulb on the sender relative to the tube, it's toasted. The tube should be sealed and filled with ether. I think someone suggested a place that can repair them a while back, but unfortunately, I didn't save that info.

as far as my memory goes (not very far) I remembered a 1800 page where this guy has a black one, fully restored only to be destroyed by a falling pine tree. He has his Smiths gauges fixed. I'll try to look for it on the web.
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and the bricks keep on rolling....