my brother decided to replace the gauges in his 3 wdo duece coupe and asked if I wanted them. said sure and then remembered that they were a set of stewart warner Stage III gauges we put in from back in the 70's. they really look vintage and should fit the comet build well. no problem with the amp gauge, oil pressure (it's mechanical) or fuel, but the water temp sending unit is missing in action. I called stewart warner and talked to their tech about what I could use as a replacement. about the most useless call I have made in a while. he had no clue on what I was talking about and questioned if I really had s/w gauges. he did say if they did make them they are discontinued now, duh, wonder why I called him. couldn't help at all about what to use for sending unit or what might interchange. sooooooooo, looking for some help on what I might do for a sending unit. haven't cleaned them up yet so hoping they will turn out better than the pictures. wish he still have the speedo and tach that matched them but guess you can't look at a no charge present any other way. alan here's a couple of pict for youngsters that don't know what I am talking about
I don't have manuals this new, but I would say any SW sender for a 12 volt water temp that reads from 100-280 would work for you. Find a NAPA store, and ask if they can order such a sender. They probably can. My Dad put SW Stage III gauges in his '33 tudor in 1977.
I run a full set of them in my 48 merc coupe. They show up all the time on ebay & the prices are not all that bad if you shop around. They made mechanical & electric for the water temp.
what kind of idiots they got working the tech line? I'm sure SW still has the sending unit. why even have a person on the other end of the line if they can't help with a pretty basic question? I had those in my Hot Rod Datsun pickup in the 80's.
Order a sending unit for SW water temp guage in the temp range of the gauge. It will work just fine. I have a set of these in my truck and the sending unit I have was orderes straight out of the Speedway catalog. Works great and reads properly. Also I am pretty sure you will have to order an external shunt for the amp guage so order one for a 60 amp guage as well.
I have three full sets of Stage III guages in the shop. I will take a look and see if there is a number on one of the senders. I think they are super guages and I have had them in almost all of my cars.The tech guys at SW are idiots. I finally found the right sender for one of my guages through a friend who spoke with a REAL parts man with an old catalog.
"Also I am pretty sure you will have to order an external shunt for the amp guage so order one for a 60 amp guage as well." My friend has the stage III gauges in his car and there is no shunt on the Amp gauge.
Are you sure it isn't mounted in a different location? Every SW amp guage I have used with the exception of the large face racing guages use external shunts.
Better use a shunt with an ammeter...or look for a Stage III Volt meter. High-power alternators (anything above 60 amps) will let the smoke out of that ammeter post haste. This was a typical problem with Panteras, as full amperage overtaxed the ammeter when headlamps and other accessories were on... Amp METER is to 'meter', or 'read' amperage, not bridge it. About that sender: Order it by its ohm value.
"Are you sure it isn't mounted in a different location? Every SW amp guage I have used with the exception of the large face racing guages use external shunts." It doesn't have an external shunt. Perhaps it is built into the gauge? The battery charge wire is on one post and the rest of the car on the other one. He installed a voltmeter and a 100 amp alt a few years ago. I'll have to check out the amp gauge the next time I look at the car. He has had some strange problems with the charging system. Maybe he pegged the gauge and it is flakey now.
I do know that the large style SW amp guages for race cars use an internal shunt, but the smaller style SW amp guages use external shunts as there is no room inside the can for a shunt, the winding is too big.
I just checked Stewart Warners web site and it looks like half their 2 1/16th amp gauges use an internal shunt. They do have external shunts on the higher value gauges, i.e. 100-0-100.
I scanned the Stage III section of the SW catalog. Please help save my bandwidth (the file is huge right now) and right click and "save as" instead of just opening from the link. I'm working on making the file smaller. http://vintagerodcomponents.com/inst/stageIII.pdf
Thanks Mr T Body! They don't list a shunt for the Stage III ammeter, just a light kit and the mounting bracket.
My Apologies for the late post There is a guy here in GA that has been selling SW stuff since 1965. If he doesn't have it, he can probably tell you what will work. Contact him Price Petrea 706 485 4469 email georgiapeddler@bellsouth.net
If the shunt was included with the gauge as part of the purchase it would not be listed separately. I would make sure you don't need one before you hook it up without one. It will **** a 10 gauge wire pretty quick.
Alan, I don't remeber using an external shunt when I wired these twenty five years ago. But I have slept since then.
New member here. I have a NOS, complete set, of these gauges. I can't get the pdf to open up regarding sending unit part numbers. Can anyone help? I plan on mounting my SW III gauges in my 70s Dodge Dart build. Thanks, Jeffrey
What are the numbers on the gauges you have. I had no problem opening the PDF file. I'll look up the sender numbers for you
Ed, Thanks. I got the PDF open. I'll take a look at my gauges and see if any of the sending unit numbers are missing from the brochure. I saw they refer to page 30 for a few of the sending unit part numbers, which isn't in the original PDF. Thanks again, Jeffrey
Jeffrey- My buddy has Stage IIIs in his car and I'm sure he has an original catalog. Let me know if you can't find the numbers for the senders.
Her is the temp sender if you haven't got it already http://www.summitracing.com/search/.../280-degree/?Ns=Rank|Asc&autoview=ProductName
Here's a list of the gauges I have NOS in the box. 284AL: clock 283J: water temp (still need sender # from page 30 of the catalog) 283M: fuel level (same as above) 283L: oil pressure (sender 279-B) 550EZ: speedo 283A: ammeter 997A: tach I've had the gauges for 10+ years. I bought them from a guy that was a painter for Pete & Jake's. Anyone have page 30 from the catalog? Thanks, Jeffrey
I absolutely HATE those size adapters that SW and most of the other gauge manufacturers now sell. Back in the day ... you could buy the sending unit you needed in the correct size for the hole opening you had. Speedway lists the sender as #665-280ED Possibly Speedway has it in the correct size ( no adapter ) I got one from my local NAPA store about a year ago that was correct 3/8th pipe size ... no adapter needed
If you should decide to sell them, I would be interested. My gas gauge has failed and I have the whole matching set. Thanks
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