Quote:
Originally Posted by Pipo
Man, this is getting confusing. The entire time it was cool weather, temperature gauge was a little below the first mark. Actually when it failed was late afternoon and early morning, it was cool and damp. On the way back the day got hotter, I ended up running the AC the last 300 miles. Is there anyway to test a relay?
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If you're thinking that the gauge would be reading wrong if the temperature sensor was at fault then you are not entirely correct. The gauge on your dash is showing you oil temperature. This gauge relies on a signal from the oil temperature sensor. There is another temperature sensor which measures cylinder head temperature and this provides a signal to the engine management. The engine management computer uses this information to control important stuff like fueling. If the sensor is providing useless information then the engine management starts to alter the fueling to what it is being told is happening and you could end up with all sorts of nasty things going on. You may get lucky and it's only a rough idle, or it could misfire, or just die completely.
This is the temperature sensor Dottore was talking about, NOT the one for the gauge.
Sorry if you knew this already, but I by reading your post I didn't think you did.