Fitting GTi gauges to a diesel (inc. Peugeot 205 gauges)

[smiffy1071]

If people can wait till it gets a bit warmer, I'll take some pictures of how I did it on one of my cars.
I've taken a slightly different approach by having a remote oil pressure, and light switch, like this.



It's a bit of a fiddle to fit this under the fuel injection pump but once fitted, if you ever needed to replace the switch, or sender, it's a doddle!

[smiffy1071]

hi all i have obtained (for free) a pug 205 gti instrument panel, can i fit this in place of my tzd cluster? due to it having the temp gauge fitted. also will the rev counter work tho these are from a petrol engine? can i use the oil temp gauge as well? wiring advice appreciated if it is a viable swap,

To swap the petrol rev counter for a diesel one, follow the dis-assembley instructions above, then undo the two 5mm headed bolts on top and bottom of the rev counter. turn over, and twist out this connector clockwise, and push through the instrument body.



Cant remember if there are any other small bolts on the underside, but if so they are easy to get at.

[mat_fenwick]

Funnily enough, I used a remote mounted sender and pressure switch initially in the BX - I used the capillary tube from a mechanical oil pressure gauge, and then cut the gauge end off and soldered a threaded fitting to take a T-piece. I mounted that on the injector pump but when I did the 1.9 engine swap I mounted them directly on the block for neatness. I still have the length of tube with fittings if it helps anyone?

If screwing the T-piece to the block you have to make sure that it becomes tight coinciding with where you have space to screw the sender and switch into it. I had to play around with different thickness washers between the T and the block to find an acceptable position. To seal it I used an O ring which fitted between the ID of the washer, and the OD of the T-piece, and obviously of larger cross section than the washer so that it would be squeezed on tightening. Hope that makes sense!

[Kitch]

Quick Q for those in the know....

I've just fitted a temp gauge from G-SEG to the estate and done the wiring etc as smiffy suggested.

I used the sender from G-SEG (16v) rather than buying one, but so far am getting no real readings on the gauge. The gauge is powering up, as it moves up from rest with ignition. It also seemed to move about 1-2mm as the car heated up, but it's hard to measure as the n/a diesel takes so long to warm up

Just checking that I can use that sender before I go dipping the thing in boiling water to check it out.

[mat_fenwick]

Yes, that sender will be fine - you'll have a job buying a diesel BX specific one

If you quickly short the lead from the gauge to the sender to earth, the needle should flick to full scale hot. Not sure if this will damage the gauge, but I've done it briefly with no ill effects.

[Kitch]

Nice one Matt, I'll check it out.

[BX Bandit]

I'm just getting round to this and have a couple of questions.

Why is a donor connector needed? Assuming you keep the red light of death, then from what I understand the yellow light of death is redundant, but we can use the same wire, connected to the new gauge sender unit but moved at the instrument panel to pin 6?

Are the other two connections to the gauge pre-wired within the instrument panel?

[bx_pallas]

All the connections are pre-wired up to the the white 10-pin connector. The problem is just that your connector has no pins in the 3 slots for water and oil temp, and oil pressure. You can't simply connect your sensor wire there.
So you either use the connector from the donor car which then has all the pins and cable ends in the needed slots, or you extract pins from a spare connector (neccessarily by destroying it), and push them in the appropriate slots in your original connector. (Or you simply hook the sensor wire directly to back of the gauge)

The yellow light wire can only be used in non-aircon cars, in a/c cars this wire goes to a little electronic box inside the car, not to the engine.

[saintjamesy89]

I really fancy doing this mod, does it matter which temp sender is used (would a GTI type fit and work?)? Obviously it needs to fit the hole, but mine was bodged to fit an aftermarket temp gauge and has now broken (there's a threaded rod glued to the top, there's a spring in there too and the rod has come unstuck and spring has disappeared).

Looks like this


Which one of the senders (L, circled red, or R) does which light, or is it one on those Citroen specials in that there is no rule? As the LHS one has been bodged for the gauge, would it be logical to assume this one is the yellow? Never seen either of the lights.

[mat_fenwick]

You have to use the sender from a Gti/16v as they were the only ones fitted with that gauge. It's possible a sender for an aftermarket gauge may have the same resistance and temperature characteristics, (which are somewhere on this site) but I don't know. There may be a logic to the way round the warning light switches are fitted (from memory orange light switch left, red light switch right), but the one with the yellow connector is for the red warning light, and the one with the white connector is for the orange light. In your case the orange warning light switch looks to have been replaced by the aftermarket gauge sender, but I think I can just make out the original white connector dangling?

[saintjamesy89]

Thanks for the info Mat, I have bought a gauge I now just need the temp sender. There are two on ebay, both for 16v's and both look to have different thread sizes and depths, does anyone know what the thread size is for an XU 'stat housing? If the GTi will fit a TD then I guess these will be the same, but I seem to remember there being two different 'stat housings fitted to TD's.

[mat_fenwick]

It's M12 x 1.25 mm on mine at least; I would be reasonably confident that different castings have the same provision for senders. The 16v also has a sender (blue with two terminals IIRC) for the ECU to control the fuelling, and one for the sump with a threaded connection, so it's possible they may be incorrectly listed. I bought the sender from Citroen and I don't recall there being a choice - will see if I can dig out the receipt (from 9 years ago!) to give a part number for cross referencing.

[saintjamesy89]

Thanks Mat, M12 x 1.25 is the size given on the ebay ad and of the choice of two, both have only the one terminal - i'm reasonably sure the pictures match the ad writing as each ad states 'black top' and 'grey top' describing the plastic top of the sender that the terminal emerges from. Don't try too hard to find that receipt Mat, i'll go for the cheaper one on ebay, it's only £13.

[bx_pallas]

Hi,
the holes in the thermostat are all M14x1.25mm, two in front of the diesel filter and one behind it. The red cirled thing seems to be a former M14 sensor turned into an adapter: A hole drilled through, a smaller (M10?) thread cut inside and a smaller sensor fitted inside it.

[saintjamesy89]

I finally got around to fitting my new GTi sender and temp gauge this afternoon. What a fiddly job to get even just the instrument panel surround off!

All in and back together, minus one wingnut for the clock side bolt (was missing before I took it apart - will have to think of a bodge/buy a wingnut). The gauge powers up from rest, but doesn't move any further, the connector I used was the one originally attached to the wire that needs to go in position 6 - would this be why? The two look quite different, one is smooth metal band and the one I used is more like a skinny peg.