Oil pressure guage

[Jack Seed]

My oil pressure guage is always reading all the way up to the top. Do you think it would be the pressure sender or the guage that I should look at? Oil level is fine as is the oil temp. The car runs great. What are your thoughts. Thanks for any feedback.

------------------

[Renos]

I had the same problem and it proved to be a bad electrical contact on the sender unit i.e. plug attached to the sender.
Check this first



[This message has been edited by Renos (edited 07-23-2001).]

[Jack Seed]

Thanks very much. I'll check it out and report back to you.

[Decolliber]

There was a series of posts on this about two months ago. Mine did the same thing, and it turned out to be a bad sender. You can run a wire directly from the gauge to the sender to make sure it is not just a broken wire. I also put a potentiometer ($2 from Radio Shack) on the gauge, and could generate different pressure readings by varying the resistance, so I knew the gauge was OK.
The big problem is removing the sender. If it is not in tight you can get to it with a 1" or 23mm crow foot, though you may have to remove the compressor and set it aside. Mine was too tight and we(*) had to remove the block that the sender screws into, which also entails unscrewing the camshaft oil line in three places. Then place block into a vise to remove sender. You will need three new washers (see Bentley for sizes).**
* BB member Rod Walter did the work while I watched.
** I had trouble finding these washers locally and bought from JC Whitney 2 boxes of metric washers in various sizes, one copper, one aluminium.

------------------
John C
1988 Carrera coupe
1957 Speedster replica
1997 A6 Avant

[john walker's workshop]

rule of thumb: if the gauge moves then it's ok. suspect the sender, voltage variation, or connections.