Hey guys,

I'm almost done with my new center console piece and will be cutting the holes for the new gauges shortly. I already have an Autometer boost gauge and was planning on buying the Water Temp gauge and possibly an Oil Temp or Oil Pressure gauge.

My question is what would be the three best conditions to monitor, given I have room for three gauges what should I buy? I know the stock boost and coolant gauges aren't the best so I was gonna replace those but wasn't sure about the third gauge.

1. Boost Pressure
2. Water Temp
3. Oil Pressure/Temp?

I already have a different wideband A/F Ratio monitor as well....

Thanks for your input, I appreciate it.

 

i like boost ,water temp, and both oil press. and oil temp (use one of the oil filter adaptors)

 

Yeah that's what I was thinking but the way that I had the gauges laid out it would really be squeeze to get the fourth one in there.

What are you talking about for the oil filter adapter?

Anybody else care to chime in here?

 

Since you already have an oil pressure gauge, I'd go for oil temp.

 

i use something like this for the oil temp/press. senders (mines a old fc3s.org one)
http://prosportgauges.com/oil-filter-adaptor-plate.aspx

and something like this or the water temp (i had one lying around)
http://prosportgauges.com/water-temp...e-adaptor.aspx

 

Thanks for the links man!

 

If you want to do it right, it's best to weld a bung onto the oil pan so that you can take oil temps in the sump, rather than after the cooler.

 

Isn't the oil system like a loop, where does the oil that's in the sump come from? I'm serious here, I thought the oil in the pan was already cooled by the oil cooler.

Also how accurate is the stock oil pressure gauge?

 

Never mind, never mind......I wasn't thinking clear, after the oil goes through the motor it's returned to the pan, it's pumped out to the cooler and back through the filter and into the motor....


Thanks though for the heads up there.

 

Well the pedestal works too, but you're not measuring the temps at the hottest point, so it won't give you the same sort of representative temps that the water temp will give you. The only good place to put that is in the back of the water pump. It's a bit of a pain to do, but it's worth it in the end.

 

I'd put the boost gauge in a pillar pod, along w/ the AF gauge, since they are important to monitor. In the middle run a water temp, oil pressure, and an EGT gauge.

 

That's what I'd go for. Put the boost gauge on top of the steering column or something or bulid a 5one5 style for the idiot lights and add even more No wait...... it's prob

Both those adapters are pure ******* garbage. The oil adapter can spin off and cost you a motor. The rad hose adapter is a PITA if you're using a one wire sender. Take the neck off and drill and tap it for 1/8 NPT and be done with it. The best place would be PRE-t-stat but that requires more work. It's worth it though to get the accurate temps. Why do you think Mazda put theirs there?

I like the adapters because they're convientent. There's also alot more flow there so you can measure changes better I feel. As long as you know where it's mounted and what it's measuring, you should be fine.

 

DEFI link display, do it

 

If you are monitoring afr's and you have an rtek2.1 you are probably doing some tuning

I would go with an EGT gauge, a fuel pressure gauge, and a coolant temp gauge.

 

I like the SPA gauges because they have a user-programmable warning light, which is WAY more important than just a gauge reading. A friend of mine blew his $6,000 engine because he did not notice his oil pressure drop to zero on his aftermarket gauge which had no warning light or buzzer.

I was originally going to go with Auto Meter, but the representative was a jerk and didn't want to go through the trouble of ordering me a 250mph speedometer. My SPA speedometer reads up to 999mph, and my boost gauge came with a 232 PSI transducer. The SPA digital dual gauges are good for applications with limited space.
http://www.spatechnique.com/product_pages/gauges.asp

 

I like the SPA digital dual reading guages; but I would love to take it a step further! A small digital guage that reads multiple readings at once; or maybe one reading at a time, but it will switch to an specific reading when that sensor is close to a preset warning levels.

The DEFI link display seems like the closest thing to it

 

Racing Beat makes a good oil filter pedestal adapter. I have it on my car and it works well - it has 2 holes for the pressure and temp gauges.

http://www.racingbeat.com/resultset....rtNumber=11802

 

Thanks for the input.

I think I'll do the boost gauge on the pillar then, along with coolant temp, oil temp and oil pressure in the center panel. The greddy boost control will be below that and maybe an EGT gauge below that.

The NGK A/Fx monitor is mounted up with the idiot lights kinda.

This is the new center panel in progress-

 

Evil Aviator gives good advice. Warning lights are key. I'm in the process of installng a few in my buddies D90 300Tdi. I on the other hand opted for the AIM digital dash with CAN communications to my EMS. I have 6 or 8 warning lights that I can set the level that they go off at. I'll have water overheat, oil overheat, low oil pressure, low fuel pressure, low sump, low 2-stroke

 

That's what I am talking about!

Unfortunately, my E6K can't do that

 

I can set some alarms with the Rtek as well like coolant overheat too much boost, but for now I'm going with the Autometer gauges because that's what I already bought.

 

A-theyn why ask
B-add senders that close a circuit at a certian point. IE the Tdi project. We have a 215 or 220* something like that sender that closes when the temp gets too hot. We also have one that closes when the pressure drops below 10 or 15 PSI. These are both going to be wired to the Check Engine light as he prefers the ultra clean look and doesn't want LED's. The senders aren't as good as being able to set your own level (as in the AIM or the SPA's) but they add insurance.

 

Also, the prosport gauges have warning's and peak/hold features, I also think this is absolutely necessary as you're not watching these gauges the entire time you drive (that would be dangerous )

I'm running prosport oil temp/pressure and the temp warning has "saved" me (not exactly because it was only 210F) on several occaison's while beating up the car. I've since set the warn. at 230 because while driving hard it seems to stabilize at 225ish.

 

I asked for input because I wanted to know what conditions most people would want to monitor if they were going to install 3 gauges. After reading the suggestions in this thread I made the choice to install 4 gauges - boost, water temp, oil temp and oil pressure.

Like I said, thanks for your input.

 

Ah, I see now.

I would do yourself a favor and learn from the advice of Evil Aviators friend and intall a t fitting where ever you mount your pressure sender and install a warning switch as well. Something like this

http://store.summitracing.com/egnsea...115+4294801131

It will close a circuit if the oil pressure drops below 15PSI

Which gauges did you get? The original cheapo single wire senders or the nicer OEM style 3 wire with the stepper motor gauge?