Annoyed After Installing these Gauges

[Tony_SS]

First off, I am not trying to bash any manufacturer here, just telling my story.

I bought a set of Speedhut gauges and finally got a chance to take my time and install them. The GPS speedo and tach work great, so I'm happy about that.



Here are the issues with the others:

oil pressure, water temp, trans temp: These ALL jump up 10º when I put my foot on the brake or use my power windows.

volts: the needle with tick in synch with blinkers.

fuel: it's all over the place for no good reason.

I just want to document this because I know some guys on the GTO board have had the same issues and wanted to see if anyone here has had them? Any info or suggestions would be great.

My guesses are the teflon tape I used isn't letting the gauge ground itself, even though I have all the gauges grounded on the firewall, which is grounded to the rear of the engine too. As for the fuel and volt gauges I just don't know. All the grounds involved look good.

[dontlifttoshift]

It's not the gauges.

Whenever elelctrical does something weird its a ground problem. It may not be the ground on your gauges, it may be the grounds for everything else. They are chasing ground through your new, good ground on your freshly installed guages.

[uk68327]

volts: the needle with tick in synch with blinkers.

I had the same issue with some VDO gauges in my Golf G60. I ended up wiring in a 4pin relay, and finding a decent ignition switched live (there was a spare factory one going to the dash) to power the relay. Problem now solved, did not redo any of the earths. This way the voltmeter, and any other gauges will get a direct 12v feed (fused) from the battery.

Hope this helps.

[NOT A TA]

Sounds like a wiring problem not a gauge problem. I would make a couple long test leads with an inline fuse and get power/ground direct at the battery for your gauges. Test gauges as a group or individually (depending how you wired them) to confirm there isn't a problem with the gauges. Then once you've confirmed there is no problem with the gauges you can hunt for a good source of power and ground. As Donny mentioned you probably have ground issues elsewhere that are causing the gauges to react which you should still trace down. Is the body grounded to the - battery terminal with a good clean connection?

[Tony_SS]

I agree it's not the gauges. However one thing I don't like is the low voltage type of wiring used on these. They all use 30ga wire. I'm not sure I get that.. it's foreign to me.

I have a service manual and I've checked and cleaned all my grounds. The battery is grounded to the body too.

Thanks all for the feedback. I will try to run long leads and work on individual gauges to isolate the problem. I'm just hoping like hell that I don't have to undo those damn senders and take off the teflon tape on each one.

[zombiekiller]

with the oil and water guages SO MANY people do what is natural when installing the senders.... they use thread sealer or teflon tape!

This is bad! the senders for just about every aftermarket gauge get the ground from whatever boss that they thread into. If you use thread sealer, the ground gets weird.

Check to make sure that the threads are clean on the senders.

As far as grounds go, I started using these :

battery Terminal

This way I am able to spider a ground from the negative side of the battery directly to the motor, body and chassis. then i also place additional grounds at the opposite end of the vehicle between the body and chassis. make sure that the star washers used on the grounds have a good bite and are clean.

you can never have too many grounds!

[BonzoHansen]

my speedhuts do not do that. i used pipe dope on my ops and cts. you can try jumping a wire from a sender base to a ground to see if the tape is the issue. but the volt meter jumping may point to issues elsewhere. did you splice the OE gauge harness?

i will say I've caught my fuel gauge wandering a very few times, for lack of a better term, but it always got back in a few seconds. slow motion, not quick spikes. gauge otherwise works perfectly. I've chalked it up to fuel movement and maybe they dampen needle movement

[Tony_SS]

Thanks guys... I am certainly going to triple check my grounds and test them individually.

Scott, did I read that right.. you DID use teflon tape or sealer on your senders? I will ground from the sender base to an engine or body part to see what happens. I did read where a guy had to solder a ground from the sender base to the chassis. That might actually be easier than messing with fluids if that is the case... ugh.

And yes, I did splice into the OE harness in some areas. For the volts, its just an ignition wire straight from the fuse box. But all the gauges are getting '12v power' from the OE gauge power wire. Maybe I need to put a relay on that one.

[zombiekiller]

I'm not familar with the wiring schematic on your car completely, but, does the flasher for the turn signals also get its constant power from the same 12v power wire as the guages?

If so the resistance that the flasher provides may be your culprit.

I'd opt to run a different 12v source for just the gauges and it may solve your issue.

[BonzoHansen]

Thanks guys... I am certainly going to triple check my grounds and test them individually.

Scott, did I read that right.. you DID use teflon tape or sealer on your senders? I will ground from the sender base to an engine or body part to see what happens. I did read where a guy had to solder a ground from the sender base to the chassis. That might actually be easier than messing with fluids if that is the case... ugh.

And yes, I did splice into the OE harness in some areas. For the volts, its just an ignition wire straight from the fuse box. But all the gauges are getting '12v power' from the OE gauge power wire.

i used pipe dope

[Tony_SS]

I'm not familar with the wiring schematic on your car completely, but, does the flasher for the turn signals also get its constant power from the same 12v power wire as the guages?

If so the resistance that the flasher provides may be your culprit.

I'd opt to run a different 12v source for just the gauges and it may solve your issue.

Yes I do think they are on the same circuit (main gauge power and flashers). I will try to run a dedicated 12v line from the fuse box for the main power to the gauges. Thanks

i used pipe dope

Ok, had to look that up. lol. I will test a ground like you said to see if it might be my tape. Thanks