333pg333

Is there a 'Best kit' to buy for this sort of thing? I have tried logging into LR website to no avail. Perhaps they finally banned my IP address? Where else can you get a complete plug and play kit?

Eric_Oz_S2

Patrick - have you tried egauges.com? They have a great selection of gauges and temp senders + adaptors. I think the VDO Sport Comp/II looked like a good match to the stock instruments.

Just tried the web site and seems to be having trouble at the moment.

333pg333

Thanks Eric. I'll check them out. Weird, I've been having a few problems logging into various sites tonight as well??

I don't know if there's anything idiosyncratic with our particular cars and oil temp kits so if there's one that a vendor sells plug and play I'm also interested.

Rogue_Ant

LR sells a nice drain-plug fitting to make installing a oil-temp gauge a piece of cake.

333pg333

I can't get onto their site? Anyone else having this problem?

Chris White

I can help you out…I have been working with the Prosports folks on the gauge panel thing and they have some nice solutions – The oil filter sandwich adapter fits nicely (it actually makes it easier to get to the filter) and it gives you extra ports for oil pressure senders. Their gauges are really pretty nice and very affordable. I haven’t got around to redoing my website to include this stuff- but you can take a look at their site and let me know what you want – prices are the same ($38.99 for the adapter plate)

Heres a pic of the adapter – I have been running one for a over a year – works great.

Oil Temp gauge - electric with 270 degree sweep (no oil line runninn to the passenger compartment!) $39.50. Also availalble in metric!

mzman

Which would offer more accurate readings for oil temp, the drain or the sandwich plate?

reno808

This is what I did. I put the prob where the Banjo bolt is on the drain. I think this is the best place because its the hottest. Jim also told me the same thing as well
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/ATM-4447/

Chris White

Well there are two schools of thought on that – I want to know the oil temp going into the engine – that will tell me the temp (and there for the condition/viscosity) of the oil that is about to be used. If you measure the hottest point of the oil you don’t really know how hot the oil is going in to the engine – it might be handy to know if you are overheating the oil and its breaking down – but you have no idea how well the cooler is working.

Is the banjo bolt the hottest area for the oil? I am not sure about that, depends on driving conditions. It may also give a high reading that is not a real report of the general temps. The oil passing through the turbo may, in some circumstances, be a lot hotter than the oil returning to the engine from the crank. If the turbo center section is really hot (especially in non water cooler turbos) the small volume of oil retuning to the sump may be a lot hotter than the general oil supply. While that would be good to know it does not really tell you anything about the condition of the rest of the system.

The banjo bolt has always been popular because it is the easiest installation point into the pan.

Ideally you want to find two points – pre cooler and post cooler to see the high temps and the ‘functional’ temps. The temp of the oil when it is going to be used is important to make sure it is optimal for its use and peak temp is important to know you aren’t breaking down the oil by overheating it. If you are using synthetic the breakdown temp is quite high and not of as much concern, if you are running dino oil then peak temps are much more important.

And that’s my 2 cents….

blown 944

And that’s my 2 cents….[/QUOTE]......

..........that may be worth a few thousand dollars

Techno Duck

Chris, is temp off the filter plate pre, or post cooler? I wonder how much temp difference between the drain plug and filter plate.

I have mine tapped into the drain plug, considering doing a filter plate as I want to add a second pressure gauge. I have the LR adapter for the mechanical gauge but have been reading it won't work with am electronic sender (which is what I wanted to do with it) due to space constraints.

reno808

Here is why i like the Banjo bolt. Again this is just my .2 cents. The reason why i like it there is because averagely thats where the oil temp is at its the highest under heavy boosting. That being said, it's really insignificant to me what the oil temp is going in because If the oil temp reading is high at the banjo its serves as a warning. If i would have the sensor where the oil filter is and if its reading high then that means that oil is going in at a high temp to the engine and it can be too late to do anything IMHO

mzman

Meaning you can't use it with the prosports gauges that Chris offers?

gregeast

Hey Chris, we'd all appreciate it if you could talk to Prospeed and ask them to add an outer collar to the oil filter adapter that would catch and drain the oil that leaks out of the filter when its removed

Seriously, it looks like a slick solution.

333pg333

Ok so I hadn't thought of that before. Do we want to know what temp the oil is before, during, or after???

My brain tells me during or at the highest temp, but I can be convinced. I'm pretty sure I've actually got one of those sandwich plates somewhere too.

Do these gauges have a 'tell' line? Where it's been up to it's max in other words. Sometimes it's hard to see these things on the track.