For those of you with fuel gauge problems

[vkykam]

For those of you with fuel gauge problems, you know, the one where it only indicates Full when it's full, drops very quickly to empty, and may come back to life once in a while, I think I may have found the problem.

While I was accessing the fuel tank to remove the fuel pump, I had to pull the senders out as well. I should've taken pictures, but my camera was loaned to someone else (doh!). The float on the sender connects to a little box, and if you crack it open, inside there is an arm connected to the float, and a circuit board with many connections that the arm can connect to. It kind of looks like an analog voltmeter, except that the arm touches the readout portion.

What happens is that the arm is very thin (READ: FLIMSY), and can spring back far enough to not make any contact, which would cause the fuel gauge to show empty. A little bending of the arm to ensure contact to the circuit board, and that's it.

A note on removing the senders. Aside from the usual safety precautions, I found the procedures in the service manual didn't work for me. Manual says to remove both senders before removing the fuel pump, but I couldn't get either sender out until I removed the fuel pump. I ended up moving both senders out of it's "slot", shifting it aside, remove the fuel pump, then removing both the senders.

VK

[gl1674]

Yep, one way to deal with this problem.
Another one is to install an additional washer, so the arm does not have so much freeplay. Does not make the fuel gauge perfect though. One my car it still goes to empty at 13 gallons, but at
least the readings are much more consistent.

[Beav]

Did ya'll ever consider bending the float arm downwards a tad while you were in there?