Heh, just so you know I had a heck of a time installing mine. Today I installed an extra tranny cooler with an automated fan that turns on at 180 degrees. That leaked too and I decide to give it a half twist with the wrench (was only supposed to go finger tight) and it snapped off on me. Now I need to order another temp sensor. Otherwise it all looks and works good. I suppose I could jsut put a regular switch on the fan and turn it on when the temp gets over 180 on the guage. Anyway, I digress. The tranny temp guage is always a good thing. I don't know if they all install in similar ways. The Autometer guage can either go in the pan or in the line. The pan requires welding and some other part according to their directions. I just bought a 3/8" brass T and 2 3/8"-3/8" flared fittings to clamp into the transmission hose that runs to the top of the radiator.

If you do the T, put all the pieces together. Flared pieces that slide inside the hose and the temp sensor assembly. Put teflon tape on all the pieces that screw together including the temp sensor itself. Tighten it all down good with your wrenches. Then go underneath and cut the soft hose part of the line. Slide the flared ends of the T assemly into each end of the cut line. Then put the screw clamps over the line where the flared ends go into the line. Tighten that down. Then you have to gound the T. I took a clamp and put it around the area where the temp sensor connects to the T. Then took a wire and stripped it back about an inch. I slid that in betweeen the clamp and the brass T and tightened that down. Attach the other end of the wire to a good grounding location. The rest is pretty self explanatory. The only other PITA thing I had to do was find a location in the cab for the temp guage. I drilled a hole with a hole saw in the dash panel jsut to the right of the steering column. On my 02 f150 that panel just pops off. Really if I had it to do over I would just buy or build a mounting point that would put the guage down where the brake controller is so I can peak down there and see it. In the 04's and up there might be a better location. I'll go take a couple pictures.

 

Here's a picture of it.

 

Here's the guage in the dash. I shoulda got black, but it's not too bad.

 

Wow thanks Viper for the info! I will give it a try. It looks like you did a really good job on it. I will feel alot better just having that guage. Thanks again!

 

take a look at "notes from a 10,000 mile trip" I think that if my old truck can haul 7200 lbs (revised numbers since I got it weighed) from florida to alaska almost straight through, then you ought to be ok... the tranny cooler and guage goes without saying though.

 

akheloce1 thats quite the task! Sounds like your F150 didnt give you any problems then? At the end of the trip did you check your trans fluid and did it look OK or was it scorched, etc.? Any immediate problems arise that you can tell was related to that trip (trans slipping, noise from rear end etc.)? Reading that story certainly eases my concerns quite a bit, especially considering my 7000# trips are only 180 mile round trips maybe 3 or 4 times a year. OK, I will officially stop figuring out ways to trade up to a 5.4, at least for now....