I use a VDO pressure sender as my fuel pressure sender.  I have it
permanently mounted in the engine compartment attached to the fuel
pressure testing tap.  It works reliably for me.  I like it because I
can at least rule out low fuel pressure as a source of the numerous
problems that affect drivability of my Westy.  ;-)

FYI, I was originally using a cheap JC Whitney oil pressure gauge and
it died on me after a few weeks.  :-((  Worse, it was giving me
incorrect readings.  :-((((  which made debugging the fuel system much
more difficult.  I identified the problem by running a mechanical
gauge in parallel to the electronic sender and running repeated tests.

The VDO pressure sender seems to be of a much higher quality.

If you're going to run more wires under the van, you might want to
consider running a pre-built wiring loom, like the type the sell for
trailer lights.  That way, you can run four wires at once at the wires
will be of different colors.

What sender are you using to read your vacuum?  Do they sell a VDO
sender for that?  I'm intrigued.

If you start putting different senders onto different gauges just be
aware that there are different types of senders.  I think that the VDO
pressure senders are 0-180 ohms and that needs to match up to the
proper gauge.

Let me know about the vacuum gauge.  I've got two spare wires running
from my engine compartment to my dash that I could tap into.

Also, does this really help with isolating vacuum leaks?  I always
suspect I have vacuum leaks, but never went through the hassle of
attaching a vacuum gauge.  I've got a mechanical vacuum gauge tucked
away someplace in the garage.

-- Craig

On Wed, 6 Oct 2004 17:46:41 -0500, Max Wellhouse <maxjoyce@ipa.net> wrote:
> Can I use my spare VDO oil pressure sender as a fuel pressure sending
> unit?  I have used it for this purpose once to check FP diagnostically, but
> was wondering if it was okay for long term use?  I was going to run two
> extra wires from the engine compartment up to my 3 gauge pod on top of the
> instrument cluster(op/vacuum, and oil temp).
>
> By rigging up two toggle or rocker switches nearby, I was going to have the
> pressure gauge where I could read either oil or fuel pressure and then have
> the temp gauge do both water and oil.  Now if I can just get a toggle
> switch to make the vacuum gauge read volts(yes, I'm taking that too far).
>
> thanks
>
> Max
>