Ok, the Alfa 1.7 lump is in, timed up and running.

The proper cooling system's next (currently the rad is plumbed in but sitting on the floor 2 foot behind the car!) and I need to know what's going on temperature-wise so I can decide on header/expansion tanks etc.

Now the dash has an aftermarket temp gauge in it; "Electric Cockpit" is all it's labeled. It seemed to read OK when the old Fiat lump was in there, but I notice most gauges seem to come with their own sender.

Is there a big variation or are most water temp senders pretty universal??
What are my chances of it reading correctly with a standard Alfa temp sender??

Cheers

Paul.

They're not particularly universal but you might be lucky. If it worked with the Fiat sender it may work with the Alfa one too. They may both be Magneti Marelli electrics. Alternatively you could wire the sender to the gauge and drop it in hot water. It should read 'normal' at around 85 degrees or 'hot' in boiling water.

Thanks for that John.

I ran the engine up tonight with the sender wired in and the gauge does read but no idea how accurately. Since then I've read up a bit more and the feeling seems to be that the sender should be rated for the same range as the gauge.

I've no idea what range the Alfa gauge/sender spanned, and the gauge covers a slightly unusual 40 to 140 degrees C - Most of the modern gauges seem to be 40 to 120 and have matching senders.

I'll probably wire it in for now as it at least gives me a rough idea of the temperature, but given the gauge itself isn't in the best condition I think longer term it'll get swapped out - I quite like the ETB yellow dials!

I run an adjustable capillary thermostat, figures that was the safe option when playing about with electric fans and rad that were designed for a totally different application. My temp gauge reads pretty close to the actual temp, probably as close as most cars do anyway, gauge and engine are worlds apart but it still works.

......... and basically it doesn't really matter if the gauge is reading the exact temperature or not. All you really need to know is whether the engine is running hotter than it normally does, so providing the needle is somewhere near the centre the gauge during normal running you are 90% there.

Cool .. pun intended

Well I've gone ahead and ordered the ETB one yesterday as I like the colour :rolleyes:

There's a couple of week wait time from them, so I'll wire the existing one in anyway as the new sender and gauge can use that wiring later.

Once the bracket for the rad gets sorted I can fit fans etc and get a good idea of how hot it's going to run and whether I can get away without the header tank or not - seem to think there's an article downstairs about that ;)

Yes. Part 2 is in the new issue.

Hi paul - last year suspecting the pleb that built my car threw on any old temp gauge, I removed the block mounted sender unit, calibrated it in a kettle of water, via letting it boil then taking temp measurements while it cools, on the dash mounted gauge and via a thermocouple also in the kettle, sure enough it was out by 10 degrees.......also years ago when I worked for Weber-alpha I had to take some resistance curves of temp senders - there are hunderds and they are all different!!!

also suspecting my thermostat is dodgy I have this evening just fitted a new thermostat and housing (from allparts for £30), sure enough its now running to around 90degC gauge temp (now actual temp) and it fluctuates between 90 and 95 while running........previously it did not fluctuate (indicating slow/lazy/stuck thermsotat opening) and would run at about 80 around town, then while on a hard run it would fly off the scale and nearly boil over!!!!........it turns is a classic symptom, as the alfa boxer thermostats are prone to either sticking open or being troublesome, so all I'm saying is beware!!!.......

GTMdriver is also quite right, but its nice to have an accurate reading to start with. B)

check these links on the Alfa forum........

http://www.alfa-pages.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=5986

http://www.alfa-pages.co.uk/viewtopic.php?...9&highlight=cts

http://www.alfa-restoration.co.uk/jetronic/tempsender.html

http://www.alfa-restoration.co.uk/

Knighty - The thermostat is about the only bit of the cooling system I haven't replaced :rolleyes: , will definitely keep an eye on it as work progresses. I'm assuming you have the same big sealed lump of a thermostat housing - good to know they're still available. Glad to hear you've sorted the overheating.

The ETB gauge and sender turned up yesterday - once I get rid of this stinking cold I've had for 3 days I'll have a play with it.

cool - just so you know, the standard alfa temp gauge sender unit is located in the water cooled inlet manifiold, on the rearmost right (drivers side) cylinder, assuming the engine orientation as per rear engined fug layout.

New stuff : :D

neat!.......where from, what make and how much???......that will match my fug a treat!!........is the sender matched with the gauge???

Knighty,

The gauges are from http://www.etbinstruments.com

Had my eye on these from a few years back when the car was running, just the temp one for now but have plans to add speedo and fuel gauge later as they are a nice colour match to mine as well.

Total was about £37 for the lot - i.e. gauge, matched sender with adapter.

Paul.