Under the hood, drill the dasboard, over the dashboard, place it on the left pillar. That's too time consuming.
Just get the "Scan Gauge" and plug it into the obdII diagnostics port. Besides it being a trip computer, one of the gauges is a water temperature digital readout. D.
Just another sign of the "drivers are stupid, they don't need to know anything" mentality of modern cars. Well, not JUST modern cars- General Motors used nothing but idiot lights on most of its cars through the 60s and 70s, but GM was the exception. Then in the 80s, Ford started using "gauges" that were controlled by pressure switches for oil pressure- so that they either read "normal" or "zero". Yeah, real helpful, but it stopped people complaining about "the oil pressure changes when I speed up!"
From a driver information standpoint, the BEST setup is a gauge AND a "check gauges" light that turns on (and sometimes rings a chime) when a gauge is out of range. Its easy to overlook a gauge that's slowly creeping out of range.
Don't be so sure that the temeprature gauge is any better than the idiot light. Many US and Japanese manufacturers now install temperature gauges that are controlled by the engine computer (PCM) instead of directly by a temperature transducer. They move upwards sort of like a "real" temperature gauge as the car warms up, but it is an act controlled by the PCM. The guage moves only in response to the commands from the PCM. Unless the car overheats, the gauge is commanded to the "normal" position. Some have an intermediate position between "normal" and "hot," some don't. Either way, it is only a little better than the "idiot" light you don't like. I don't know if the cars you mentioned have this sort of guage. I know my Ford Fusion and Nissan Frontier do. I think my SO's RAV4 does as well, but I have not had a chance to review the wiring diagrams to be sure. I suspect if you want "real" gauges you will need to install them yourself, or buy a German car.
Ed
Do you know the refrigerant pressure in your refrigerator? No? Why not?
Do you know the temperature inside your fridge? Oh, I see--you added a thermometer so you'd know. The little "1-6" dial isn't enough for you, so you added something the manufacturer didn't include. And yet you bought the fridge anyhow.
good analogy!
On Apr 4, 1:56 pm, snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com wrote: snip
I'm gonna challenge your assumption that the Corolla, although somewhat more expensive to purchase, delivering 26/35 mpg and with historically outstanding reliability, will cost more to operate and insure than the smaller cars on your list over the course of 250,000 miles.
You might want to test drive these cars on the same roads and at the same speeds as your daily commute.
Then get a Ford Focus, or some other similiar car with a gauge instead. Then call up all the makers of the cars that you didn't buy and mention that a lack of temperature gauge was why you didn't buy their car.
I wouldn't buy a car without a temperature gauge, or tachometer either. That and I always add a voltmeter.
Shamefully, even BMW has embraced the fake gauges. I cannot imagine what they were thinking.
--scott
they were thinking through the engineering functions rationally and logically!
that makes no logical sense because the temperature gauge is extremely non-linear. it doesn't really tell you anything other than whether the motor is in the normal range or if it's too hot. and only one of those two pieces of information is actually important. a light can do that job, probably better because you might actually pay attention!
elmo's analogy is excellent because there's a lot of info about many things that any machine operator doesn't actually need to know - they only need to know if something is wrong. and this is one of those situations.
People still do that? Hoses outlast engines these days. I have had it happen twice already.
two engines??? doubtless their demise was assisted by your close attention to the highly accurate and meaningful temperature gauge.
Many present vehicles have software which "smooths" the response of the water temperature gauge so much that is practically is an idiot light.
Not having one wouldn't be a deal breaker for me.
They were thinking "DAMN I wish all these nitwits that are complaining because the oil pressure gauge moves when the engine changes speed would go away and let us build cars!!"
People that don't have a clue about how an engine works and were complaining to Ford about 'fluctuating oil pressure' (which was in fact perfectly normal) are EXACTLY why Ford went to an idiot gauge (pressure switch) way back when.
The "my car is a toaster" crowd that made the Camry the best stilling POS in the world is ruining the driving experience for the rest of us more and more every day.
Because, unlike a car, a refrigerator's refrigerant system is hermetically sealed. It CANNOT leak unless its physically punctured. Refrigerators don't fail by losing refrigerant, they fail when the compressor locks up or burns out.
That is without a doubt the STUPIDEST analogy I've ever read.
And if you really see a car as equivalent to an 'appliance,' then we've really got nothing to discuss anyway.
Oh, REALLY?
That's patently nonsense, and I can give you a concrete example. The whole point is that the gauge will tell you when some things are wrong that a dipshit light will not. My wife's car (1993 Chrysler LH) has an analog temperature gauge which, despite actually being routed second-hand through the engine computer, has come in very handy. That car has dual electric cooling fans, and a few years ago one fan motor failed. Because it had a GAUGE and not an idiot light, she was able to see that it was running just slightly hotter than normal (about 1/2 division, or maybe 15 degrees F) in traffic, so we opened the hood and checked things out. The one remaining fan *SOUNDED* normal, so I would have ever noticed the problem without that gauge, and my wife could have been stranded somewhere or I could have wound up with a pair of warped cylinder heads and a ruined engine if the second fan had failed also. Instead I was able to put the fan motor on order and then replace it without ever having to take the car out of service except for the actual time required to change the fan motor (about half an hour).
Similarly, I've had oil pressure gauges behaving in an abnormal way warn me that the oil filter had collapsed internally and was bypassing all the time- something that an idiot light would never do.
Lights are ONLY useful to call attention to a reading that's gone out of range. Gauges warn before the problem gets critical. The best of both worlds is a light that tells you to check the gauges.
Then you must have really crappy engines....
Ah, so it CAN leak. Wouldn't you want to know if that happened?
The point is, something could go wrong at any time, refrigerator or car. Wouldn't you want a gauge showing you at a moment's notice as the refrigerant is slowly leaking out, so that you don't end up with a warm fridge and spoiled food?
of COURSE that's abnormal. But then, so is the car overheating.
You really don't understand how the world works, do you.
Yes, the car is an appliance--for 99.9% of the people out there. Yet you, somehow, think that your desire to have a temp gauge that behaves the way you want it means that it's a necessity.
Hardly. There's a car, actually a plethora of them, for every taste.
At any rate, now we know what your ACTUAL complaint is. You can't find a car to suit your particular tastes.
Ain't that a bitch.
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