I just replaced my fuel gauge and fuel sender that I had Year One rebuild and recalibrated. I removed the tarnish on the printed circuit board since I had access to it. Everything was fine for a week and then both the fuel and temp gauge stopped working more or less. They are still getting power but they only move when I power the car up. They then go to a semi rest position and do nothing more. I tried replacing the instrument voltage regulator and nothing changes. Can someone shed some light on my problem? Could the cicuit board be broken somewhere? I'll probably pull the cluster out and physically check the sender this weekend. The ground strap is new just in case you were wondering.

Thanks-Dart68

Could be a faulty instrument cluster ground.

_________________
一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

I've seen the fuse look OK, but just stop making contact due to slight corrosion - usually, just removing and reinstalling it fixes it.

Faulty instrument cluster ground? Could there be a corrosion problem where the printed circuit board meets the cluster housing? Or should I be looking into the wiring? I noticed on top of the new instrument voltage reglator that there is what looks like male electrical terminal that extends to the ground slot in the printed circuit board. What would or could be wired to this terminal? I didn't get to look at it today, so I'll try tomorrow.

Thanks

If it extends to the PCB ground then I would expect it to be connected to chassis ground.

_________________
David Kight
'62 Valiant Signet, White
'98 Dodge Dakota
'06 Jeep Liberty

Growing older is unavoidable but growing up is strictly optional.

Okay, I checked all connections on circuit board and even added a extra ground wire for the voltage limiter. I am still having the same problem. Could it be the circuit board or something with the wiring? Should I just grab another cluster? Too bad there is not an after market cluster that will fit in my dash without cutting.

Thanks-Dart68

A way to hunt down your poor connections somewhere is, with ignition on, engine off, disconnect the temp sensor and measure the voltage at the wire - it should be near 12V pulsing on & off ~ 1Hz. (It usually takes 5-20sec to warm up enough to start pulsing when 1st turned on.)

If you see 12V w/o pulsing, your voltage limiter probably has no ground; if you see no volage, your voltage limiter isn't giving power to the gauge; if you seem << 12V you have a very high resistance somewhere along the line.

If your dash ground is bad, the dash lights will only work poorly or not at all. If they all work fine, your board is grounded OK.

It is quite possible that one or more of the PC board connections right at the voltage limiter has gone bad. You can check it - with the ignition off, you should get almost no resistance from the ignition feed to the +5V side of the gauges; you should have almost no resistance.

The brass clips right at the board can be removed, cleaned, and if necc. soldered in place. The board can be repaired with solder and a little wire if required.

Also, the little pins for the round multipin connector are very delicate and can wiggle loose and make a poor connection to the PC board; you can clean them up and solder a little around the base to fix them; but unless you really forced them, it is unlikely that both fuel and temp would go bad at the same time.