I have to say I am getting a little tired of the mileage this stock 2.8 gets. when the money shows up in will go a 4spd auto. On average I get less than 200 miles to a tank. As stated in my title it really happened Thursday 7/14 and I still had two bars on my gas gage. Well I have known for for over a year that my gas gage was off and I was just trying to get too far. Well to make a long story short I fixed this particular problem without dropping the tank.

I removed and disassembled the instrument cluster. Next I made a mental note (picture) where my gas needle was. Following this I popped off the needle and with the instrument panel hot I repositioned the needle two bars lower. Voila, it works like a charm and now I have an accurate gage. Hopefully I don't wait any more till the yellow "e" bar. I probably will once to see what type of mileage it takes to get there, we'll just have to see. I am just stupid enough to see just exactly how far the car will go before a refill is manditory.

Hope this is helpful to someone out there that is frustrated with an inaccurate gas gage.
EDIT: spelling of VOILA
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Make it FAST or don't make it

LITTLE RED BOMB..............Someday it will be mine..The Teacher
www.velocityaircraft.com

[This message has been edited by stalen88GT (edited 07-23-2005).]

When you fill it up, does it now read really really full? (pegged to the extreme right)

when I used to fill up it would show "over filled." Now with the first tank of gas after the adjustment it is right on the full line.

Seems like a lotta people go more by the odometer than the gas gauges . Personally I get nervous if I don't fill up after about 180 miles but running out of gas around LA could be VERY hazardous to your health, depending on where you are and what time of day it is ..... believe it or not, there are some places where a tall skinny white man just doesn't feel welcome

[This message has been edited by PaulJK (edited 07-16-2005).]

quote Originally posted by PaulJK: Seems like a lotta people go more by the odometer than the gas gauges . Personally I get nervous if I don't fill up after about 180 miles but running out of gas around LA could be VERY hazardous to your health, depending on where you are and what time of day it is ..... believe it or not, there are some places where a tall skinny white man just doesn't feel welcome

I usually do go by the odometer and as you stated above and about mile 180 I too start looking for a station.

Please don't judge me by the sig. pic. of myself. I shave my head once a year to celebrate the end of another school year. The very last day of school is my break out party. Skinhead mentality would not go too far in the Ed system. I agree with the not welcome part. It also works the other way round too, unfortunately, that a black man of any shade is probably not welcome in a redneck trailer park, but lucky for me I live in the IE in a pretty mixed neighborhood.

Sorry to get off topic. Any way I am hoping that my "new" gage with a more accurate read will que my befuddled brain to get gas at the right time and NOT wait till I am sucking fumes. THe hard part is having to push my car out of traffic and just knowing people are probably siggering at my misfortune in my hot little car, thinking I'm all that. Now that I metioin it, Damn it I am.

I really wasn't judging ... there are people from 140 countries in LA County, and most of them are clustered in their own communitites ... hell, there are probably white neighborhoods that wouldn't want to see me coming ...

Mine used to over peg also, put in 2 bottles of techron & it lowered it to just above the full line when full.

Can you go into more detail how you moved your gas gauge reading?
Mine is 1/4 tank off!

[This message has been edited by NorthFloridaFiero (edited 07-16-2005).]

mine is also 1/8th off, my guess is that there is like a 60% chance of breaking the gas needle when removing it and putting it back on, sounds risky to me, and how the &&^$ did you "fix" your gas guage by dumping in techron? i dumped 2 bottles (same time) of synpower fuel injector cleaner to 3 gallons of gas and all i got was an akward scary power boost lol each bottle trets 20gals, so i fugure 40gal treatment to 3 gallons will do something interesting right? lol, im constantly spraying cleaners in the tb, dumping in fuel injector cleaner, running "sea foam" through the intake, running **** loads of acetone in my gas and so on, bacically cause i can get this stuff for free, so let me be the test dummy, dont worry about running crap threw the eng.(anyone know of a good pore in power booster?)

quote Originally posted by NorthFloridaFiero: Can you go into more detail how you moved your gas gauge reading? Mine is 1/4 tank off!

Basically I took the whole instrument panel appart and took off the clear plastic protective cover. I disconnected the electrical to the cluster and even remove the temp/gas instrument cluster. The needle is in two parts. there is the black cover that sits over the needle and the needle itself which is attached to the electronic sensor that adjusts the needle back and forth depending on how full your tank is. There is a female attach point on the needle that is friction mounted on the sensor. It is a mother of monkey to get it off. So I use a needle nose pliers to pull it off. You do need to be careful because you could damage the plastic and then the black cap may not fit back over the needle, if that happens use super glue. It works great. Anyway, long story short. Once you have the needle off, hook the electrical back up to the panel and reposition your needle to its new position. I took my time making sure that I had it exactly right, so I lightly place the needle on the sensor and physically moved the needle to the full position or empty just to see if it would reposition to the new corrected spot. All worked very well so I buttoned up the panel and put everything all back.

I am not sure if both electrical connections on the back of the panel need to be plugged in to get the sensor to work but I only had one plugged in and temporarily thought I had screwed my instrument panel up. There is a black connector on the left side and an opaque white one on the right, make sure they are plugged in and everything else should work out.

I just got tired of having an inaccurate gage and decided to fix it. I had asked on this forum a while back and got a whole lot of dropping gas tanks and that is not what I like doing so I took the easy road.

Galen

Mine has always read 1/4 tank off and after 2 times of runnin outa gas at 220 miles i just went by the odometer (4 cyl).

quote Originally posted by delta: Mine has always read 1/4 tank off and after 2 times of runnin outa gas at 220 miles i just went by the odometer (4 cyl).

I agree with your method of measuring gas milage and when to refill because that is what I do as well. But it is nice to have an accurate gage, because we do not have an idot light to warn us.

This may not apply to all years. With my 88, I find that once the gas pump starts cutting off and won't let any more gas in, I can wait 30 seconds, pull the nozzle out a couple of inches and slowly squeeze in at *least* another full gallon if I dribble the gas in little spurts waiting 10-15 seconds between them.. I imagine the expansion tank (or whatever system they use to deal with expansion) is taking the rest.

This can give me another 40-50 miles on a tankfull. It's a pain to dribble the gas in.. It can take an extra 5 minutes when filling up. I don't alwyas do it, but it's nice on long trips.. In the long run it means less gas stops.

I have a newer Ford truck that does the same thing..

quote Originally posted by Poncho Jim: This may not apply to all years. With my 88, I find that once the gas pump starts cutting off and won't let any more gas in, I can wait 30 seconds, pull the nozzle out a couple of inches and slowly squeeze in at *least* another full gallon if I dribble the gas in little spurts waiting 10-15 seconds between them.. I imagine the expansion tank (or whatever system they use to deal with expansion) is taking the rest. This can give me another 40-50 miles on a tankfull. It's a pain to dribble the gas in.. It can take an extra 5 minutes when filling up. I don't alwyas do it, but it's nice on long trips.. In the long run it means less gas stops. I have a newer Ford truck that does the same thing..

I have just recently been doing this myself and have achieved over 200 miles on a tank. Still very little comparatively to newer cars. I want a 4 speed auto as my next upgrade for this beast. anyone got one lying around for 50 bucks shipped? Ya I am cheap.

quote Originally posted by stalen88GT: walla (really don't know how to spell that word)

It's a French word: "Voila!", usually used as an expletive. The rough translation is "Aha!"

I took mine off an realigned it at well. It use to run out a tad before empty.

Somehow I got the thing dead on perfect. Never had a car with a mor accurate gas guage.

Just completed my first tank after the realignment and voila, perfect. I am very happy with my "new" gage.

quote Originally posted by Poncho Jim: This may not apply to all years. With my 88, I find that once the gas pump starts cutting off and won't let any more gas in, I can wait 30 seconds, pull the nozzle out a couple of inches and slowly squeeze in at *least* another full gallon if I dribble the gas in little spurts waiting 10-15 seconds between them.. I imagine the expansion tank (or whatever system they use to deal with expansion) is taking the rest. This can give me another 40-50 miles on a tankfull. It's a pain to dribble the gas in.. It can take an extra 5 minutes when filling up. I don't alwyas do it, but it's nice on long trips.. In the long run it means less gas stops. I have a newer Ford truck that does the same thing..

Good way, probably the best way, to ruin your charcoal cannister. The expansion tank in part is there to prevent liquid fuel from getting to the cannister. In only takes one instance of liquid fuel contamination of the cannister to ruin it permanently. Without it you'll be losing a small, but ever increasing cosly, amount of fuel to evaporation.

JazzMan