from the land of not quite right

[kenbob]

I ordered a gas gauge from Amazon for my tractor. Instructions are plain--3 wires + - and one to sender. From what I know about gas gauges when you hook up + and - the gauge should peg over to full. It did not. When i attached the - to the sender it did peg over so there is life in the gauge. For the ground (-) and the + I went directly to the battery. I sent the first gauge back and got another of the same. It works (or doesn't work) in exactly the same way. Am I missing something or is it more %&*#& chinese junk? Thanks all in advance.

 

[DKase]

Some gauge sets go to full when grounded. Others go to empty. and there are several different resistance values to make the sets work properly. The chances any old gauge would work with any random sender is 10%.

 

[DKase]

Let us know what tractor you are working on and we will see if we can figure out what resistance value you need.

 

[kenbob]

I checked the olms on my Case300 and it is supposed to match my gauge. The fact that when nothing happens when the ground is connected, but goes to full when i hook the ground to the negative terminal tells me the gauge is working as far as the needle goes, but the negative terminal on the gauge must be dead. I just got an multi meter and not quite up on its use but if i touch the plus and minus with the thing set on ohms I should get a beep if there if the + and - are both good?

 

[kenbob]

My 300 runs fine but I am not going to restore it. I was toying with the idea of selling the gauge cluster to someone who is restoring. Instead of doing the metal plate with 5 gagues I cut one out of wood. Fuel gauge is usually more trouble that it is worth, but the dash with 1 big and 3 small gauges doesn't look quite right. I already have the hole made for a 2 gauge. I turned on the multimeter, touched the leads together and got zero reistance. When I do plus and minus posts on the gauge it jumps around and settles down to .2 and sometimes says OL

 

[Joe (Wa)]

(quoted from post at 21:58:05 09/22/23) I checked the olms on my Case300 and it is supposed to match my gauge. The fact that when nothing happens when the ground is connected, but goes to full when i hook the ground to the negative terminal tells me the gauge is working as far as the needle goes, but the negative terminal on the gauge must be dead.

This a 12v gauge in a 12v circuit? Is this an open movement like the original 300 cluster gas gauge or enclosed in a case?

If it is a SW gauge the movement 12v ground is in contact with the back of the case (or pod if the same as the original gas gauge) and the case in turn to the terminal simply b/c the terminal is mounted on the case. If the gauge movement is not in contact with the inside back of the case (or pod) neg terminal will not be in the 12 circuit.