Bongo Fury

Progress has been a bit slow since I set out to make an arrangement for top hose temperature monitoring. I will just put some images on here to give you an idea of whats involved.




The hose was second hand as you should be able to use the one on your vehicle.
Purchase of the housing (48mm), sensor and gauge from ebay.
I used PTF on the sensor thread - the housing is aluminium so care needs to be taken when fitting sensor into housing.

Next I will be showing the fitting & wiring required during installation. I will use an external temp reader to check that the reading on the gauge is good/accurate. Look out for part 2 soon.

nope can't figure out how to put pictures on here

We can supply inline hose adapters that can be used to get a sensor into the coolant.

You have to post the images off site (use something like Photobucket) and insert the URL between the IMG tags.

Thanks Ian - it wasn't working as the link came with [IMG at either end. I was tring to put the link in between the two [img on the forum menu. Any comments good/bad welcomed!

haydn callow wrote:We can supply inline hose adapters that can be used to get a sensor into the coolant.

Have you a photo of the inline adapters and the thread dimension for the sensor

Go to the website below and look at the sensor section.
We have them in many diameters and they can be drilled/threaded to any size.
They are glass filled plastic so are extremely durable.

If you wanted to supply them with a sensor fitted we could supply them to you or you can use the engineering company we use.

They cost about £8/10 to have made in batches of about 20 (depends on diameter, the material is expensive)

Alternatively we could supply the whole thing if that's what members want

Just for the record, what are the pros and cons of this measurement over an engine block sensor?

There is little difference....I have both and they run about 2degrees difference and no time lag

You have 2 more potential joints to leak

It also depends which pipe you fit the sensor(s) to. By fitting one on the radiator side of the thermostat you can see that the thermostat is opening & closing correctly & by monitoring the return from the radiator, you see it is doing its job of reducing the coolant temperature.

The non-invasive method is to fix the sensor to the outside of the pipe & then there are no worries about extra joints to leak. I've got one on the cam cover & one taped to outside of pipe.

haydn callow wrote:You have 2 more potential joints to leak

Engine block sounds like my preference plus no issues with misreading in event of coolant loss. Thanks both.

I am confused by the scare that 2 more joints are to be considered weakness areas - if done correctly with the correct equipment there is no increase in risk of coolant leak other than to support one method as being superior to another. I don't see that from a technical perspective installing a sensor and housing in the top hose can be detrimental. If this were to be the case the entire saloon and rally car usage in competition engines would be a waste of time. Theses guys know their stuff and simply would not add further risk to engines where coolant temperatures are critical

Engine blocks are in essence part of the engine cooling system as are cylinder heads. The only common sensor arrangement on engine blocks has and is a knock sensors feeding data to the ECU. I don't know of any car manufacture/maker using temperature sensors on cylinder blocks but temperature sensors on cylinder heads are common. If there was a positive gain to adding temperature sensors to the block I am sure many manufacturers would already be up to speed with this need.

As with most of Bongo kit on offer you get what you are willing to pay for. In my case being ex industry (not on the sale of vehicles) I am experimenting with what might be advantages at a sensible cost and analysis of temperature in the cooling system including how such a sensor would react to the absence of coolant - would it give a false positive? In any case I am in no hurry.

Sincere apologies, I wasn't knocking the hose method in any way, just feeling unadventurous. I suspect the best way to measure temperature is by a probe in the coolant system, but it means putting more joints in the system and I can see that increases the potential for leaks. No problem if you are a skilled engineer, but for me ........

Hi
Mike
I have a sensor in the hose coming from the cylinder head....been in there about 6-7 years, and no leaks...and 11 other sensors / gauges...some used when Steve did the cooling system plans...we used the data from here because of the huge temperature differences...it gets a tad hotter, and colder than Japan, so it's a pretty good "go" a what the system was designed for. It's interesting how the temperatures around the system change during the course of a journey. speed related, terrain related, external air temperature, sampling data every 2 minutes, another set done at given distances....also how the head heats and cools in relation to the water passing through...how hitting the right speed maintains a perfect equilibrium....you could tune your MPG by watching the cooling system sensors, as when it's in perfect balance, your doing the perfect speed ...too slow, and the cooling works too hard...too fast and you're burning juice...
It not only helps checking what's going on, but a bit of added fun!
Cheers
Helen