Update on this year's projects!

Cool, I would like to see the new changes !

Yeah, we need to get together! Car Craft didn't work out, and so on. You need any help putting your Fairmont back together?

ZephyrEFI wrote:

Yeah, we need to get together! Car Craft didn't work out, and so on. You need any help putting your Fairmont back together?

It is together...just need to take the time to dial in the distributor and timing. I am hoping to do so this weekend.....maybe even tomorrow...!?
We do need to get together, are you coming to Elko for that race night where we can put our cars on the track with club members ? I really want to do that !!!! My car handle turns very well !!

I'll bet it does! I wasn't planning on it, I'm not doing the suspension on my car until next year. ... and i don't have a helmet, haha. Might be fun just to go though!

I'm picking my car up tomorrow, and then I have to put the sound insulation stuff in and a few other things before I put the interior back in. I took it out to make it easier for them to work on the floors. And then I need to pull the stupid gas tank again to re-fix the gas gauge. I don't want to drive it too far without having that done. But it's been gone so long, I barely remember what it looks like! haha

just a question, didn't the ES have single headlights, I cant remember, I don't think there were many made. I'm glad you are making progress....

The Fairmont ES did have single headlights, yes. They only sold them for '78 and '79, before Ford decided all Fairmonts would be Futuras and have 4 eyes. But, no Zephyrs were ever 2-eyes. They always had the same headlight and grille treatment, except on the ES, the grille was blacked out. It's hardly noticeable. I do think the Fairmont ES grille treatment was a bit cooler.

Well, the car's back and the interior's back in. It's much quieter! I'm also pretty excited because I have a different natural black center console that went in it that fits WAY better than the dyed, beat up one that I had before. I dare say the interior's DONE! I guess unless you count the new seat foam I want to get for the driver's seat...







I also answered my wheel question and got these Mustang SVO wheels!



Still gotta pull the gas tank out, but I have a show I like to go to this weekend, so I'll keep it in one piece until then.

that's quite a lot of work you've done!! the interior looks quite nice also. I like the tilt wheel, I had a problem finding a multifunction switch for mine I was getting pissed from using one out of a cougar, oh it worked fine, however I had little room between the steering wheel and the switch lever when using low beams, I was going to try one from a Taurus, but never got around to it.
The way you located the power window switches in place of the parking brake lever is pretty cool, I like the cup holder as well.
I used the same steering wheel, that's my favorite steering wheel. however I didn't have the mercury emblem in the center, it looks pretty cool.
well done.
at least you are getting some work done, mine is just sitting.

Those SVO wheels will look great on there!

I went round and round with the multifunction switch. I ended up buying a NEW one from Rock Auto. Also, you need to know the airbag years used the same connectors, but the pins were scrambled! So you could plug it in, but it wouldn't work! That was fun.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to putting the SVO wheels on. I think it will turn the sleeper factor WAY up!

Looking good Brad. I gotta see it soon and get together. I started a new job just this week, just about double the pay....so this will make it a lot easier to get money for my car !

For sure! I'll be home all next weekend since Linda works. Maybe then?

Fixed my idle problem! I added the EGR system back in, and adjusted the timing back to normal (I had set it way off because the car wouldn't really run with it in the normal range when my idle problems started).

I guess there must be a trick to eliminating EGR, and I just don't know what it is. I'm okay with that though.

EGR can certainly affect ignition timing, I thought when you said you had no EGR, you had just plugged the line off to the valve, that shouldn't hurt anything, however the NOX will be up there. glad you solved the issue. hope you have miles & miles of enjoyment.

Yeah! And it does make me feel a bit better knowing (or thinking) the computer doesn't think it needs to be in "limp mode" because something's "wrong" with the engine. Whether it does that with missing EGR or not, it still makes me feel better.  

Now, if it does that because of missing Thermactor, it's out of luck!

(sigh)... trying to get up the motivation to pull the stupid gas tank... AGAIN... to fix the gas gauge once and for all.

Pulled the gas tank out today and found that the float is NOT stuck, like I thought it was. So my gauge is reading above F all the time, and I have NO idea why. It does move up there too, so the gauge itself isn't stuck either.

Could I have the polarity backwards? That just doesn't seem right to me either because the negative wire doesn't even go to the sender. I wouldn't think it would work at all if the polarity was backwards.

is the sending unit compatible with the fuel guage??

fuel injected mustangs are 15 ohm's m/t & 155 ohm's full

if the fuel sender circuit becomes disconnected/open, the fuel gauge will register over-full.

what puzzles me is the ground wire.

is the ground wire a separate wire from the body of the car to the tank?? reason why I am asking: the fuel level sender wire on the F/Inj tanks had two wires, both must be connected for the sender to operate correctly.

The fuel level sender uses the ground point at G400. This ground also supplies a ground to the fuel pump and rear lighting. It should be a bk wire.

check for continuity on the black wire of the sender to the body and at the G400 ground point, it should be close to Zero ohms. if this is good; cool, if it is not, suggest splice into the fat black wire at the fuel pump wiring connector, the fat bk wire is for the pump, the anorexic black wire is for the sender.

check for 12 volts at the y/w wire from the gauge, you should have 12 volts, however this could be a pulsing voltage...

Try shorting the yellow/white wire to the bk wire, if the ground cirxcuit is intact, the fuel level guage should read M/T.

Looks to me like on mine, the fuel PUMP is grounded through the orange wire, and has pink/black wire for power. Then the yellow wire is gauge positive, and then there's a black wire for gauge ground. The black wire is not directly connected to the sender on the LTD setup. it must just ground to the sender body or something. Maybe that's why it's not working, maybe my homemade bracket isn't grounding it correctly.

Are you sure it would read empty if you short it? According to my EVTM, high resistance is Empty and low resistance is Full. I would guess that means if it's shorted somewhere, it would read Full. Is that not the case? I'm sure I could find all this out by trial and error, but I thought I would get your experience on the subject. I tried reversing the polarity, and it didn't change anything. Gauge still reads over Full.

My rear lights work, so we know the ground is hooked up...

Which evtm and for what car are you using?? Mustang. Fairmont or LTD??? What year…….

Which sender are you currently using??

Do you still have the mustang sender?

Compare the readings of the mustang & ltd senders at full & M/T side by side. please post the readings.

Ok, i just went out to the garage and found a sender, it reads 160 full and 32 on M/T.
The book states full @145 & M/T @ 22.5.
i believe you were using the 90 Mustang model dash, so therefore this would operate your gauge correctly.
If your level sender readings are not consistent with these readings, you have to resolve this issue first.
What your sender readings at full, ½ & M/T??
Resistance (ohms) is not influenced by polarity, it is only adding resistance to the circuit, imagine a light bulb,( it is a resistor, however; it is a fixed resistor) and it knows no difference between pos & neg, so long as it gets the correct voltage and current, it is happy & will work just fine .
If you look at a fuel level sender, it is a variable resistor, influenced by the movement of the sliding contacts dependent on the float position.
The lower the level of resistance, the closer you are to having a complete circuit, the higher level of resistance would be a less complete circuit. That’s where the old saying “more is less” (more resistance less of a circuit)
What happens when you remove the wiring from the sender, does the gauge go to full.
Does the gauge go to M/T when grounded?
Does the gauge move at all??
Remove the cluster….test the fuel level sender wire resistance at the gauge connector while manipulating the sender by hand; the resistance should be consistent with the sender movement.
There is also a slosh control module built into the cluster, and then the gauge itself operates thru all of this.
Do you have another cluster hanging about?

It might be a bit before I can go out and do these tests (busy weekend), but it is a Mustang sender grafted onto the LTD sender body, using a steel bracket. My EVTM is for an '87 Mustang. The gauge does move. When the car is off it sits somewhere like 3/4 tank, and when you turn the car on it goes to over full. Sometimes it's in different spots above the F. Makes sense what you say about resistance. I don't have an extra cluster; I only have my suburban garage at home, so I don't have a lot of room for extra stuff.

I'll let you know what happens when I get into the nitty gritty testing.

I wish I had a 7 car garage with a 3 bdrm home, instead all I have is a 2 car garage and a shed, a shite of stuff stored in garbage cans on the back porch and some more garbage cans out back and a pile of wheels.i'm so pleased at the amount of space i'm starting to have.
I got up early this am to work on my car since I am off this weekend, but it hasn't stopped raining.
i'm looking at buying an 01 Taurus that needs a lot of work, engine/trans/radiator/ac compressor etc, so the Fairmont may have to wait again.
it's got a great interior, and bar some dents on the roof, the body is straight. I just need the lady to settle on a realistic price, I offered more than the junk yard would offer.
imagine that; me buying a Taurus!!!

did you have both wires from the sender hooked up to the wiring loom. I don't think you can get away without grounding the sender ground.
sorry I am totally out of the loop so far as the LTD sender assy looks or is wired-up, or what the resistance values are. please advise.

It's a 4 wire connector onto the sending unit. 2 for the pump, 2 for the gauge. It looks just like the Mustang connectors, it's just 1 4-wire connector instead of 2 2-wire connectors. I have all 4 hooked into the wiring loom. The black wire goes from the sender body to ground G301, I think. The yellow wire goes to the gauge. It's all '90 Mustang wiring other than the sending unit itself.

I'm wondering if I can solder a ground wire right to the other side of the resistance strip, like the positive is wired in. And then run it right up to the black wire. Do that instead of grounding it through the sender body. I wonder if that would help... or be wrong... or what. Gotta do my tests first though, I guess. Do some good old-fashioned diagnosis.

You just want to flip the Taurus, or what? I'm surprised it needs an engine, I thought the Vulcan and Duratec were both pretty good motors.

nah, it's a keeper if I get it, it's got 140 on it, never had the coolant flushed or plugs changed or any maintenance, the coolant turned to rusty water and rotted off the vanes on the water pump, the radiator was so blocked it wouldn't drain even with 15 psi press on it from the pressure tester, had to rod the drain out with a coat hanger, then big chunks of rust came out. 2 cyl's low on compression etc etc.

Well, gentlemen, it looks like we have another case of "Brad f***ed it up". I got it all apart, tested everything and it's all good. I get 16 ohms at empty and 160 at full.

The sender body is a very tight fit going into its hole in the gas tank, especially with the new bracket I had to make for the Mustang sender facing the opposite direction it's meant to. I'm guessing what must have happened was, once I squeezed it in there last time, it must've come apart so the arm was no longer contacting the resistance strip. I guess now I have to find a way to make sure it doesn't come apart. I'm thinking a hose clamp bent into a square or something.

Oddly though, when I check for continuity at the yellow gauge positive wire, I get about 69 ohms, rather than Open Loop. Do you think that means it's shorted to the body somewhere? The black wire, I get a tiny decimal of ohms. When I test the gauge with the sender out of the tank, it works properly, if that means anything.