FWIW, my factory temp gauge, after a few minutes of driving, will come up to just above half way and then drop back to a little below half. After a restart when fully warmed up, the gauge will again rise to just above half and then drop back to just below half after a driving.

here's my wire.

 

That is about where mine runs when moving.

If it is hot out and AC is on and stop for long stop lights it will come up some till I start moving again.
Only time it has come up to half is sitting for 10 minutes AC on and 90° out but start moving it came right down.

I also gave a new 192° stat and has been checked with inferred temp gun and is right.
What temperature stat you running?
Dave ----

 

Here we go with the comical gauge thread. "My gauge is on the N". "But my gauge is on the O".

What is your purpose with hooking the gauge up? Just to get it working? Sounds like it is. If you don't think it's moving enough, you could try a new sending unit. What do you do after that? Where ever it ends up you call that good? That's about all you can do. If you want to know what the real temp of the engine is, put a aftermarket gauge on it that has real numbers on it.

 

That spot in the picture is on the heater hose branch, so it will have coolant flowing through at all times. The computer did monitor the coolant at all times, that was how it adjusted the timing and the fuel curves. The engine goes into closed loop before the thermostat opens, the engine can be up to temp before the thermostat opens. They want to go into closed loop as soon as possible to control emissions of the engine. That is the reason the oxygen sensor is heated and it is mounted as close as they can get to the engine in the exhaust pipe.

That location will work if you can physically get the aftermarket sender in place there.

 

Dave I hate to say this but ............. now that I am on my computer I see that is the heater hose connection so it will be getting water all the time.
He might get lucky and the sender will fit there.
Dave ----

 

You did not do the test correctly. The truck does not need to be running. Grounding out the wire will peg the gauge to full hot. If it did not do that there is something wrong with the wire or the gauge.

Do you have good heat? Do the hoses get hot enough that you cannot hold them? The needle on the 87, ‘89 and ‘94 at operating temperature is usually right around the O in NORMAL. They run at the low end just like a Mustang did back then.

 

Dirty, loose connections add resistance to the circuit and will cause your guage to read low. These guages were designed to read straight up mid guage when at operating temperature. That's the way my guages have read since new. It started reading colder so I cleaned up the connection and re attached. Right back to mid guage reading.

 

Anyone else care to say where their factory gauge reads? I have too much fun in these factory gauge threads.

 

My temp gauge reads between the first A and the H.

The truck is a special Yankee limited edition originally produced for the New England market. The gauge says NAHMAL instead of NORMAL.

 

In my experience (96 f150 300 etc)

The gauge where NORMAL is , is about 20-30 degrees of difference from the N to the L. But above that it goes exponentially higher and before it goes exponentially lower, seemingly at least. I am using what my obd2 live data says when I say this, so my coolant sensor possibly has drift. its due for a new sensor(and pigtail, different connection anyway now)

94 had a lot of bad sending units(for the .. frick.. was it the PCM ones or maybe it was the gauge ones.. one of them. lol) fun fact. When I drive, its usually about middle or less than middle, if i idle its slightly past that. If I floor it, it will cool down a lot, if I let off it heats up, something tells me my cheap thermostat may be sticking partially or have a weak spring or just made wrong.

 

for the love of all that is holy, get that piece of junk plastic filter out of there. I had a filter like it that started to break down with ethanol free gasoline so Something tells me if they look exactly like that they are CRAP quality, wix makes a great metal 3/8 about the same size.
Also, your fuel bend there is quite quick, I would suggest either a hose coil kit if they make them that small or a larger bend to make less stress on that 90 or realize you put the filter in the wrong place since thats before the pump. I am not sure if you knew this ,but unless you have a fuel pump by your tank and the manual pump isnt having to do allof the work, you are strangling your fuel pump, which I could see the strategic value in if you werent talking about a pump which all it has between pumping gasoline in your oil is a diaphram.

Think on it
also your pcv grommet is pulling out of the cover
also if thats a generic HEI distributor for a ford but of gm style, you should consider getting a recurve by getting a spring and weight kit, the advance weights are half the time installed improper(The center pivot part is like backwards way too often) and they usually use a sbc 350's spring set. I dont remember if the sbc 350 has the same rotation as the 300 on the distributor , but if it doesnt then some parts elsewhere may be incorrect or backwards as well. Also they made i6 hei caps that did not house the coil but allowed someone to mount a coil(much like the oem fords had) externally, and you could just use a later or whenever 300 coil bracket and a cable to connect, this would solve the worst weakness of the gm HEI distributor.
also the module inside needs to be fitted with thermal paste if you want to extend its life beyond miserable lol. they get wacky and then they get confusing behavior etc.

 

In at least one case, mine, the temperature sender connection between the unit and the engine failed. Check for continuity between sensor body and block. Mine was single digit ohms when it should infinity. Unscrewed, cleaned sensor threads and the hole it came out of and reinstalled.

If you buy a new sender you would most likely cure this bad connection in the process never knowing that the original sender was fine. If you buy new, take a moment to compare resistance between the lug and body of both new and old. Just to see how they compare.

Now, I return this thread to the ditch it has run off into.

 

I guess you already know on at least the 89-up (could even be the 87-up) most Ford oil pressure gauges are fake. All you have to do is look at your oil pressure sending unit. If it's a large round can, it's the real thing. If it's the smaller switch style, then it's a fake gauge. They put a resistor in the cluster circuit board with the correct resistance to make the gauge always read right in the middle for oil pressure. The only way the oil pressure gauge would drop is if the switch made contact because the oil pressure was less than 5 pounds oil pressure. Another great Ford idea. That shows you the value Ford gave their own cluster gauges for giving information.

 

I worked at a Ford dealership in the mid 90’s. Some of the vehicles would be mid gauge but brand new Mustangs would always read at the N or O which is where my 5.0L trucks have always run. That is with a 195° thermostat.

That’s weird.

The factory gauge isn’t the most accurate thing especially since there are no numbers but if there is a problem it does let me know.

 

Mine reads at the W.
I might have it upside-down.