The temp gauge on my 1996 F-150 doesn't work. It has the 5.8 liter engine. Which sender is for the gauge? Is it the one right by the thermostat housing with two wires going to it or is it the one on the drivers side of the lower intake manifold towards the front with one wire going to it? Also what voltage should I see going to the sender? Is it common for a single gauge to fail in the instrument cluster?

Thanks

 

The temp guage sender is the single wire unit. The two wire unit is the ECT sensor which provides temperature data to the computer.

The senders often go bad, but so do the in-dash guage.

You can test the guage as follows: Disconnect the wire from the sender. Alternately short the wire to ground and remove it while observing the in-dash guage. One position (probably disconnected) will give a full-scale reading and the other will give a no-reading. It depends on how the circuit is laid out as to which will be which.

Steve

 

If I remember correctly I had 3.7 volts at the connector for the sender and with the wire disconnected or grounded the gauge doesn't move. It looks as if the actual gauge is bad.