This spins off of a previous thread in which I was asking why the temp gauge was not working for my 1990 Loyale w/ 155k miles.

 

I'd like to investigate the connections at the coolant temp sensor for corrosion hoping I can just clean it up and get the guage working again. This is probably obvious to most but I'm new to auto mechanics and have questions.

 

Does this engine EA82 (non-turbo) have more than one sensor or just the single one on the thermostat housing?

 

Assuming that's the one that sends a signal to the dashboard guage, theres a short (~ 2 in) wire coming out of the sender that ends in a green plastic connector. I pulled the connector apart and it looks clean in there. So to check the connection at the sensor do I just yank the wire off at t-stat housing? I tugged a little and it wasn't coming off easily so I stopped.

 

I'd appreciate any input.

 

-shawn

I had to dissect the CTS harness on my turbowagon (CTS itself was fine) as the wires had separated from the clips inside the plug. soldered on a couple inches of new wire and soldered those to the stock clips, reassembled the plug, and GTG. might check that, good luck.

the one for the gauge is the single wire unit by the thermostat. the one for fuel control is a 2 wire on the intake coolant passage.

Since you were given the location of the gauge sensor here is some proper sensor resistances you should get with your ohmmeter with the sensor lead removed. The ohmmeter leads tie to the contact of the sensor where the lead was removed and ground. I think you are aware of this but I say this just to make sure we are both thinking the same.

 

At 122 deg. F the sensor resistance should be around 154 ohms.

At 248 deg. F the sensor resistance should be around 16 ohms.

I would guess that at normal running temps the resistance would be about 40 to 50 ohms.

 

If your first post stated the resistance is only 2 ohms then this really is bad but you need to remove the sensor lead before taking a reading so the reading is accurate.