Temp gauge inaccurate

My new Jeep has one of those rear view mirrors which has a compass and temperature gauge in it. I noticed that it is off by about 5 degrees Celsius. Is this normal? If so what's the fricken point. Cheers Frank

Reply to
FrankW
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Is it giving you the road temperature or the air temperature?

I had a Volvo that gave the road temperature which was normally hotter, sometimes a 'lot' hotter. Came in handy around freezing to know when the road went critical.

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

FrankW wrote:

Reply to
Mike Romain

Reply to
FrankW

Why would you want any other temp when driving a car? From the car's perspective, SAFETY is the paramount issue. If you are going to get the outside temp, you would want that temp to be viewed from the rose colored glasses of Safety. If the temp said 40 and there was ice on the ground, then you would want to know that the temp was really somewhere below 35 where ice might not have melted away yet.

Sorry Mike, I wasn't ranting at you ...

Reply to
Jeff Strickland

Reply to
L.W.( ßill ) Hughes III

The temp sensor is right between the radiator and the grill on the drivers side of the front end so it is giving you nose temperature.

Reply to
Coasty

I might add that on my 91XJ, it goes up, and up, and up when stuck in traffic, then down, and down, and down again when you get moving. Often, on a clearly 70F or so day, it will get over 100 after about 10 min. stuck in Los Angeles traffic.

When moving right along, it tends to read about 2-5 degrees high, compared to what the radio weather people say. The compass works pretty well though....

Regards,

DAve

Reply to
DaveW

I am aware that different conditions may affect the reading Like the temp may be higher above the black asphalt on a sunny day. (I heard of glider pilots using the hot air rise above freeway cloverleafs) But if the reading is drastically wrong in ideal test conditions, then really why bother to even put a temp gauge in a car. It's "almost" like having a fuel gauge which reads 1/4 tank when it's really empty.

Jeff Strickland wrote:

Reply to
FrankW

I think you're expecting 1% accuracy... where 5% was designed.

Professor

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Reply to
Professor
5% is a joke. Most modern temp sensors are much better than that.

Professor wrote:

Reply to
FrankW

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L.W.( ßill ) Hughes III

Reply to
macanic

Reply to
FrankW

By the way I'm really talking degrees not percent.

+/- 1 degree is acceptable +/- 5 degrees is not. There's a big difference between +15C and +20C Same for the negative numbers :-)

FrankW wrote:

Reply to
FrankW

Hell, mine will start off ~+6-8 degrees and start cooling down a tad a i get moving. Once the engine warms up it throws it off again though.

Brandonb

FrankW wrote:

Reply to
Brandonb

The sensors may be better than 5%... but the analog gauge movement is more like 5%.

Professor Check out FlashAlert at

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Professor

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