Temperature Gauge rebuild completed.

[tvacc]

I posted this in the topic we discussed about a month ago about temperature guages, but it was in the "Chassis Body" section so I thought I would post it here in the right spot.

The temperature gauge in a Lotus car with the bulb type of sender has ether in it which is very flammable which is why there was talk of burning your eyebrows, face etc.
You MUST NOT use an open flame when soldering this. I used a very low temp soldering iron.

Repaired my temp gauge about an hour ago. It works great. Took me about an hour of messing around while sort of listening to the Super Bowl in the other room. I had bought a Sunpro gauge from Autozone. About $15 Made the bath of ice and salt and stuck the bulb into the bath.

I then first cut off the spun wire guard on my broken gauge, then using a dremel cut off wheel, I cut the tubing. I had to ream it out just a bit. The hole is really small, so small that you can barely fit a very small sewing needle into it. \

Then using 3/32 brass tubing, I cleaned it all up and soldered the 332 tubing onto the capillary tube. I used about two inches of 3/32 brass tube pushing the gauge capillary tube in about half way.
I could look into the 3/32 tube and still the hole was open in the gauge tube.

I then cut away the wire guard (using a set of diagonal cutters) on the new gauge. The capillary tube on this one was smaller than the capillary tube on the old Lotus gauge, so I first put a piece of 1/16 inch tubing in the 3/32 tubing soldered it up. I then put the small capillary tube into the 1/16 tube and soldered it up.
I smelled a tiny bit of ether as I did all this. I used a very low temp circuit board soldering gun and everything was fine.
Below find the pictures of the test. Boiling water, 100 degrees centigrade. Right on the money.

Cool.
I posted pictures on my website. I tried uploading them here, but could not for some reason. I am in the computer business, but for the life of me could not do it.
Go to www.lotusowners.com
Then to the Repairs Upgrade Link.
Then the top left link is for the gauge repair.

Hope to see you all a LOG in Watkins Glen.


_________________
Tony Vaccaro
www.lotusowners.com
LOONY (Lotus Owners of New York)
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