The Cal-look Lounge

I’ve installed some gauges in the car but it making me paranoid
What should my gauges be reading 

Oil temp in Fahrenheit

Oil pressure in psi

Cylinder temp in Fahrenheit

Thanks in advance

My gauges from VDO give Celsius (oil) and BAR.
I dont have a cilinder temp.

Do you have a picture of your gauges?
Are the gauges and senders from the same brand?

all the gauges are from autometer with matching senders

sorry dont have any pictures

What are your reading as i can convert them to F

I like my psi to be roughly 10 psi per 1000 rpm, head temp should stay lower than 325F and oil temp should stay run about 180-200F or so. I start to panic when my stock oil light flickers at idle, heads go past 350 and oil past 220 especially when the engine is not under a lot of load. Cylinder head temp (CHT) is the one that varies the most under load and will eventually affect oil temp.

When oil temp gets over 200, I start to take notice. When it gets to 230, pull over!

Except for a tach,  gauges are just something to worry about...if it's running hot, you'll smell it or hear the exhaust "tinkling" when you shut the engine off.  Keep it simple...if the engine combo is "right," gauges arn't really a necessity.  My two cents.

i'm not doing to bad oil pressure is about 50-60psi oil temp 180-185 and head temp about 220f  8)



Thinking of getting a big roll of black tape.......








just to sick over the lot so i can't see them ;D

PERFECT!!  ;D

i have run my engine for several km with temperatures of 110 and 120 celcius, but that is really bad. my bearings were not happy with that. so now i got an extra cooler on the 1641 and it works out very well. it stays at 80°C and maybe reach 90°C when driving for long stretches on the highway. it cools of  to 85 again as soon as i get of the highway.

but maybe it is different with other oils which can withstand more temperature but i run 20W-40 duckhams and the best performance i get with the engine is around 80°. i don't really know if it is only my experience, but at this temperature the car drives the best, accellerates better and faster... maybe it has to do with the amount of hot air in the enginecompartment??? but that is how it all works for me.
and for these gauges in my car, i have to admit i keep a close watch on them. better safe than sorry. i toasted bearings once because i had no idea what temperature i was supposed to be reading so yes at that point is was more for looks, but now i see it as a helpfull tool.

it´s cracked heads and seized cylinders/pistons you should be worried about....   I think your bearing problem was caused by something else.

and you mean 20w50 duckhams - right ?  I haven´t heard of w40...

it´s cracked heads and seized cylinders/pistons you should be worried about....   I think your bearing problem was caused by something else.

and you mean 20w50 duckhams - right ?  I haven´t heard of w40...


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right i is 20W 50... my bad, and prehaps you are right with the heads and cylinders. i know i was very lucky i didn't do more damage on that engine. and the bearings will suffer also as no oil can get to the bearings anymore at that point.

But I like having all those little hands waving "Good Morning" when I start the car.

It may be worth checking the accuracy of the cylinder head temperature gauge. I have found that my VDO gauge reads 30F over temperature at 212F.