Ive got a summit gauge and sending unit in my race car and have been having problems with it reading and displaying the temp wrong. I have replaced the sending unit and got a different problem using both sending units. So heres the question. What do you guys use in your track cars to monitor the coolant temp? Id love to be able to wire a gauge in that gets its temp numbers from my Hondata s300 since it seems to always work perfect. What are some good ideas?

Thanks for the help!!!!!

 

We recently installed an Autometer electrical gauge in a friends car and noticed that the gauge reads about 10 degrees colder than the s300. The sender is installed where the factory temp sender used to be right next to ECT temp sensor. If you want to read ECU actual values I would look into the tunerview rd1.

 

FWIW, I've always used direct reading temp gauges. For this very reason. Direct reading gauges read the temp all the time, they don't need any wiring or a pesky sending unit.

You can look in the car at any time and see the water temp without having to turn power on.

Same with oil pressure, direct reading.

 

How does a direct reading gauge work?

 

It's basically a thermocouple, which is made of two different wires, alumal and chromal that when they are heated give off a electrical curent that is measured by the gauge as the needle moves.

Oil pressure, you run a copper line with a couple loopes in it to the back of the gauge.
The yellow car would run 110psi at full throttle. Never had a oil leak.

I ran a plastic line on my 1970 340 Duster back in the day for it's oil pressure, which was about 45psi at 3000 rpm and a direct reading oil and water temp, Stuart Warner gauges.

I also believe direct reading is less money too. I'm old school. I'm not impressed by all these high dollar digital gauges with fancy light's and gauges that read a number of diferent things.

I want to look at each gauge and see how thing are doing with out having to push a tiny button to find what I'm looking for.

Sorry, done with rant...

 

The rant was god lol!!! I too believe in keeping things as simple as possible which is why all I have is an oil pressure gauge, a digital water temp gauge, and a tach. No button pressing required. But obviously my digital gauge is not very reliable though.

 

I know it's hard to resist keeping up with the next guy in this digital age. But when it comes to important things it's hard to beat, "keep it simple, stupid".

I understand data logging, but that gets into a whole different amount of money...

I used to hate trying to figure out what the fuel pressure was during cranking the engine to start it, with a direct reading fuel pressure gauge it would read while cranking.

I guess you could wire it direct to the battery thru it's own switch.

 

How accurate is the direct reading style gauge. Let's say I like my car to be at 180 degrees when I'm on the line will it read that accurately? I have never considered needle style gauges to be very accurate. But if this is the solution but I'm looking for I will definitely purchase one.

 

You are not "supposed" to run oil or fuel lines into the car for a gauge.IIRC.

 

I thought you could if you isolate.