318 Aftermarket Temp Sender

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Map63Vette

Map63Vette

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So I just went out and bought a little set of triple gauges to try to keep better track of everything going on (the car had an engine swap from /6 to 318 and I wanted a volt meter since the stock ammeter connectors at the firewall were fairly melted), but am having some issues trying to figure out where to put the temperature probe for the new temp gauge. Evidently Mopar likes tiny little temp senders, but there is no way the gauge will fit in the stock hole (pretty sure it's a stock 318 intake, has aftermarket Carter carb, but intake looks pretty normal). Has anyone else out there come up with a clever way of putting in an aftermarket temperature probe on a stock 318? I was thinking of just making a sleeve with a bung in it or putting a t fitting on a heater hose to pull off of one of the hoses, but wondered if there was a better way to do it. Any suggestions? Picture would be great if anyone has them :-D.
 
The problem lies within the size of the sender and probe length, totally not designed for a MoPar. That is a mechanical guage probe you have. Long and bulky.

An electric gauge will work just as well. There very good these days unlike yesteryears.

In order to install that unit, you'll need to go to the Home DePot/hardware store and get pipe fittings to fit a port on the intake and move it upwards.
 
Autometer also makes a small probe that uses a 1/4" npt fitting. I'm using one on my rpm intake.
 
Yeah, I would have liked to get all electric gauges, but I can't really find anything in a little triple pack. I was lucky to finally find one with a voltmeter. I went to a local swap meet the other day and everything seems to have ammeters in them for some reason. There is already a mechanical oil pressure gauge in the engine bay thats just sitting on an inner fender, so I can just use the line already there instead of going electronic. The temp gauge in the car sort of works, but I'm fairly certain it's not paired to the sender since someone did an engine swap. It reads at the first tick mark of the "normal" range when my laser thermometer says about 180 on the hoses. I figured it should run near the middle at that temp, but I could be wrong.
 
I had to double brass fittings.
car pics 66 Dart 181.jpg

car pics 66 Dart 181.jpg
 
So did you just use one fitting to up the size from 1/4 or whatever is it and then another one as a spacer so that the probe didn't bottom out? Does it respond pretty well to temperature changes or is it sort of lazy since it's not really in the flow so much?
 
Thats what I was talking about, what Pettyblue did. The sensor need not be in the flow of the coolent, though it could only help. The sensor will work well like that.
 
Super T said:
Couldn't you drill and retap the hole for the larger sending unit?
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That did cross my mind. It would make it somewhat easier because then all i would need would be a spacer I could thread in instead of some crazy reducers and such, but Vart is right that the probe is pretty long, probably 1.5 to 2".
 
My dad made an aluminum block that was the same size and shape as the thermostat housing that was about 2 inches tall with a hole drilled and tapped for the probe to go in. We used longer bolts for the thermostat housing and cut about an inch off of the rad hose. The spot that he put the probe makes it barely visible from the front.
 
72dart_swinger said:
My dad made an aluminum block that was the same size and shape as the thermostat housing that was about 2 inches tall with a hole drilled and tapped for the probe to go in. We used longer bolts for the thermostat housing and cut about an inch off of the rad hose. The spot that he put the probe makes it barely visible from the front.
Click to expand...

Ah, that's quite clever. I had thought about doing something similar, but on one of the hater hoses. The one next to the thermostat on the intake attaches to a pipe that threads in, so I was thinking about getting a t fitting or something there, but I need to find out which heater hose is always hot before I get too far ahead of myself. Have you got any picture of what you did? I would be interested to see what it looks like.I had though about thermostat housing stuff but didn't know if it would interfere with the actual thermostat.
 
Map63Vette said:
Ah, that's quite clever. I had thought about doing something similar, but on one of the hater hoses. The one next to the thermostat on the intake attaches to a pipe that threads in, so I was thinking about getting a t fitting or something there, but I need to find out which heater hose is always hot before I get too far ahead of myself. Have you got any picture of what you did? I would be interested to see what it looks like.I had though about thermostat housing stuff but didn't know if it would interfere with the actual thermostat.
Click to expand...

Sorry I dont have any pics, i am at college right now and my car is 200+ miles away. If you look up at pettybluedarts picture it doesn't stick up as high as the chrome piece on his radiator hose at the thermostat. On ours the hole for the probe is on the back side so all that you see is the wire coming to the probe, and it isnt that obvious of what we did. As far as it interfering with the thermostat, the piece is flat on the top just like the manifold where the thermostat goes, and we put the thermostat on the top of the new aluminum piece. Basically it lifts the thermostat and the housing up two inches. The probe is under the thermostat a good inch so it wont interfere, it is in the flow of the coolant, and there aren't multiple brass pipe fittings sticking up on the motor.
 
Hmm, I might have to look into that. Just went to the hardware store today and did the quick fix of just buying some reducers and spacers, but I like the idea of a cleaner install that doesn't look quite so odd at some point. Probably swapping intake when I redo the engine though, so I'll have to see what I have to work with then.
 
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