I just hooked up an Autometer fuel gauge in my 1955 Dodge Truck. The gauge and the truck are 12 volts, but the sending unit is the original, so it was running on 6 volts. The gauge goes to Full when I start the truck, but the tank is almost empty. Do I have to change the sending unit or should I put a voltage reducer in to drop the voltage to 6 volts? Thanks for any help you can give me.
You need to Match the sender to the fuel gauge. AutoMeter make a few different senders ... so you need the correct one for 12V to read properly. Some are 0-280 ohm ... others are 73-10 ohm ( factory Ford ) You will need to know which sender OHM range you need.
Check for a good ground first! Alot of the time when a gas gauge shows full and it isn't there is a complete lack of ground. Some sending units got their ground through the tank straps. I added a ground wire from one of the sending unit mounting screws to the chassis and it solved the beginning of my gas gauge issues! Adjusting it to read correctly after it registered a reading was another matter!
Thanks for the information. I made sure I had a good ground, but the gauge still reads full. I am going to pull out the sending unit, and install a new one that is matched to the gauge. I was hoping the original would work. I have to drop the tank to do it since there is no access to the sender from the top of the tank - my old body does'nt like laying under a truck like it did 45 years ago.
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