If the t-stat fails you will overheat the engine before you notice it on the gauge. Thats why i refuse to use the upper rad hose. Since your rocking a rtek i guess its ok though?

 

i still have no clue what to do

contemplating tapping the water pump..dont know how i feel about it though

 

Why not tap into the heater core inlet like mentioned before? That's right after the hot side of the motor, so you are going to get good readings from it. Besides, cutting a hose in half and using two worm gear hose clamps to hold an aluminum adapter in there is a hell of a lot easier than removing the water pump. Heck, I even think I have an adapter that I will give you for this, lol.

 

The heater core inlet hose leads directly to the water valve before the core, so if you have temperature set to COLD on the Logicon, there is no flow through that loop.

Not sure how that would affect your reading but it's something to consider.

 

Thanks for the clarification, I was thinking something would prevent that from being a good spot to use, I was hoping for somebody to chime in.

 

what if the temp is set to right in the middle? i usually leave it right there. but i do use a/c during the summer so that wouldnt be an ideal place...i do have a spare car with a spare engine...im tempted to try and tap that water pump. not sure how i feel about cracking that open though...also then having to replace the gasket

 

Its really not that hard to remove the waterpump and if its never been replaced now might be an opportune time. The only thing holding me up is that I don't have the tools to actually drill and tap the hole.

I'm very curious as to what size the hole in your iron is though. Since I'm making a custom gauge cluster I won't need the stock gauge so I'm determined to figure out how I can use the stock sensor location...