• Welcome to the Contour Enthusiasts Group, the best resource for the Ford Contour and Mercury Mystique.

    You can register to join the community.

Who has the "How to"

TourEnvy

Hard-core CEG'er
Joined
Oct 23, 2006
Messages
2,725
Location
Las Vegas , NV
I remember seeing a How to for A pillar gauges in someones Sig. Anyone know who it is. I want to see if it has any additional Information for the job than I already have.
 
Oil pressure
Water temp
Volts

All Electrical/Phantoms.

What I know is the sending unit for the Oil pressure can go down near the oil filter (just forward) it will fit 3/8" -18 pipe thread. Question though is there a one other than the one with the stock sending unit behind the compressor? Or is my only option is to T it off. I read its a PITA.

I also heard you can put it in the valley near the Tb, but this OP after the cams and not recommended. Im curious if there is much difference?

Water pump can be T'd off of where the stock unit is on the tube near the top of the engine. Anyone know what fitting size?

Volts will run off of a piggy back in the fuse panel, or an ignition source.

Can i run the rest of the of the gauges power source off the same fuse?

Lighting will run off the dimmer or headlight switch

Ground will be behind the kick panel driver side.


I would love to at least get the sending units in this weekend, with the little time I have and plan where all my connections will be.

Any additional Suggestions or Answers to my question are appreciated.
 
I connected the power for my guages to the yellow wire on the ignition switch so they would turn on in the acc. possition. green will only work in the run possition.


Connect the power for the lights to the dimmer so that you can dim the guages with the dash.

oil pressure sender does make a big difference. At the head it will only read 25 psi off idle or ~12 at idle. when you read off the main oil galley you will get 65 psi off idle over 2.5 krpm and ~20 psi at idle. both are over 75 psi when cold
 
Brapple,

You dont have more info on fittings used, do ya? I read a tread you posted about hooking up the water temp gauge, that was helpful. The stock sender is driver side, below and infront the TB right?
 
yes, the stock sender for the coolant temp guage is directly under the tb. I plan to T- the stock sender with the Autometer one. iirc its 3/8 in size ...


you can read this thread also ....
http://www.newcougar.org/forums/2-5l-duratec-performance/118862-quick-temperature-question.html

I got a female 3/8th tee and a male/male adaptor to put the T in the crossover pipe. Then the stock sender will thread into one side of the T and I used the reducer fitting that came with the autometer sender to install on the other side.

now I just need to install it in the car ...
 
Last edited:
Yup thats the tread i refer to.

Does anyone have more info on the oil sending unit? Fittings? Sizes? Specific location?
 
Well, I got everything installed and hooked up.......except the the oil pressure sending unit. I ll have to say that couldnt find what I was looking for. I was expecting a 1/4" pipe plug in the block. From what I read it next to the filter. All I saw was a ~5/8" plug which looked like a freeze plug. Am I wrong? There is one this size on the the front and the back. If Im just not seeing it, ill have to remove something, I mean its pretty tight up there, A/C, Manifold, filter, oil cooler. I even tried to hook it up to the back head temporarily and that is pretty tight aswell. Either one Im going to use a remote mount.

BTW Love the gauges and pod :eek: Oil pressure at 0 :blackeye:
 
For oil pressure you'd usually want to go off the factory sender, however it is behind the A/C compressor and a pain to get to/t off of. I'm not sure as to alternates, but i have heard that the electric sender is too big to use there. my oil pressure was mechanical.
 
Off with the compressor i guess. Like i said, i will probably have to remote mount the Elec. Sending unit using a autometer kit or nylon tubing. really didnt think I needed to dig that far to get to it but, oh well.
 
I ended placing mine temporarily in the head. I used -an fittings and braided line. I will only have to get one fitting to make it work down on the block. the setup is using a remote kit with braided line is super nice but super $$. I ilke it though.
 
I ended placing mine temporarily in the head. I used -an fittings and braided line. I will only have to get one fitting to make it work down on the block. the setup is using a remote kit with braided line is super nice but super $$. I ilke it though.

I'm a little late to the party. I used a spare port behind the AC pump with my electric Autometer gauge. I ended up using an adapter to go down from the size of the port to a smaller pipe thread, then from that to brake line connector. Then from brake line connector to 3/8" brake line ( I think it was around 18" but I'm not sure ). I carefully bent the brake line to snake around the dipstick tube and out above the AC pump. I then ran it over to underneath the water hose running across the engine. With a couple more adapters I went back from brake line fittings to the electric sending unit. I strapped the oil pressure sending unit to the water hose using large hose clamps. The whole setup is pretty rigid (it's all attached to the engine so it moves together) and was a major pain in the arse to plumb but it works great now :)

I switched from mechanical because I couldn't keep that plastic tubing from kinking/leaking to save my life. Luckily it never leaked in the car.

Oh and I had the mechanical in the head originally then moved to behind the AC pump. It's easy with plastic tubing but I wanted all hard line so it would be more resilient.
 
What did you have to remove to get the spot behind the AC compressor? Since i went with -AN I had a piece to connect the line to the head, the line itself, and piece that connected to the sending unit. I curious if mine ended up being cheaper because I didnt use all those adapters. :laugh: I remember reading that you used hard line but I dont have that much experience with it.

My impressions were you cant use nylon tubing with an electrical sender??


oh BTW Brapple's post about pressure readings in the head was dead nuts.
 
What did you have to remove to get the spot behind the AC compressor? Since i went with -AN I had a piece to connect the line to the head, the line itself, and piece that connected to the sending unit. I curious if mine ended up being cheaper because I didnt use all those adapters. :laugh: I remember reading that you used hard line but I dont have that much experience with it.

Whatever works :) The adapters were kinda a pain in the butt, I was really just worried that with all those connections I was that much more likely to have one leak. To get at it I just took the belt off and removed the four bolts that hold the compressor to the block. I think I loosened the canister on the subframe so I could rotate it and that gave me some wiggle room with the AC lines running to the compressor. It was rather uncomfortable to work on.

TourEnvy said:
My impressions were you cant use nylon tubing with an electrical sender??


oh BTW Brapple's post about pressure readings in the head was dead nuts.

Which post? I am curious what's been reported for those numbers.
 
Which post? I am curious what's been reported for those numbers.


oil pressure at the head

cold start up ~75 psi
idle warm ~12 psi
cruise on highway warmed up ~25 psi

from remote oil filter

cold start up ~75 psi
idle warm ~ 20 psi
cruise on highway warmed up ~65 psi
between idle and ~2.5 Krpm ~20 to 45 psi


side note: when you get to normal operational pressure after start up the oil temp will be around ~180, I saw ~212 in stop and go the other week. should be about the same as the coolant for the SVT because of the oil heater (cooler)...
 
Cool I think I saw about the same numbers from the cylinder head. Now behind the AC pump my gauge pegs out on cold start up (100+) but after it warms up it runs between 35-65 driving and probably around 20-25 at idle. It's been a while since I drove it though so I'm not real sure :crazy:
 
Back
Top