'49 car fuel sending unit testing

[19Fordy]

Gosh, CJ I don't have an answer. The piece of cardboard only serves to make sure
the gas tank sending unit is not touching any metal. The 6V dry cell test will work only when using the stock 6V gauge and the stock 6V gas tank sending unit. A 12V Mustang sending unit will only work with the matching 12V fuel gauge.

[CJStefan]

I'm stumped myself. The battery is reading 5.85v with a multimeter so it's good. Maybe I'm not getting a good ground off the gauge housing..? I'm grounding the wire through the bolt hole so I figure it has to be good. I really dont want to take the easy way out but I'm half tempted to just do under dash gauges. I also dont want to stare at 4 dead gauges in the cluster. It'll drive me insane.

[CJStefan]

Does the gauge itself need to be grounded if it's out of the cluster or no?

[CJStefan]

Wait a minute now!!! The new gauge is moving. The only thing is it's stopping at just about 1/8. So I'm guessing that means that the sending unit is no good or..?

[19Fordy]

A 6V battery is actually fully charged when it reads slightly over 6V on a multimeter.
5.85 will not give you accurate readings.

Gauge does not have to be grounded if its outside the cluster.

Carefully pry off the lid of the sending unit and gently clean the points with 600 grit or smoother emory paper. Use a vise to secure the sending unit being careful not to crush it. Also, be very careful not to break the carbon resistor or any of the fine wires. If they break, your unit is toast. Install the lid by resting the outer flange (with the screw holes) of the sending unit flange on top of your vise jaws and reinstall the lid by gently tapping it in place with the little alignment notches matching. Be gentle with a firm tap. The little star wheel is used to fine tune the accuracy of the sending unit with the gauge. Don't mess with it. The last photo shows what the inside of the internal mechanism of the dash gauge looks like. 1949 uses the same principle.

[CJStefan]

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Heres a new one for these nos gauges...I got the temp gauge today and out of the box it's on hot. Is it supposed to be like that or no?

[51woodie]

CJ I don't know how many years Ford set up the gauges this way, but the design is for the gauges to fail worst case, if there is a problem in the circuit. In my '46, The OIL fails to 0, the FUEL fails to E, and TEMP fails to hot. The TEMP gauge reads H until I turn the ignition on, then it goes to C until the engine warms up , and the FUEL gauge will then move from E to read the tank level. Look at the temp gauge in the pic and you will see it is pegged at H.