'68 fuel gauge inop

[68 Toro]

It happened.

The fuel gauge on my 1968 Toronado is now inoperative.

At first, it was sluggish, now it permanently reads about 1/2 full.

To be safe, I fill up every 100 miles.

Any suggestions as to the sequence of procedures to follow to get it operational?

Thank you.

[tadmin]

Mine is in a similar state, but I have not yet had time to deal with it. Do you have the service manual? It has troubleshooting steps for the fuel gauge in it. Let me know if you need me to get scans for you.

I also asked the TOA staff and technical advisors to step up and help. Let us know if you make any progress! This is valuable knowledge.

Mike

It happened.

The fuel gauge on my 1968 Toronado is now inoperative.

At first, it was sluggish, now it permanently reads about 1/2 full.

To be safe, I fill up every 100 miles.

Any suggestions as to the sequence of procedures to follow to get it operational?

Thank you.

[Sparky]

Dave,

Yes, I'm pretty sure there is a trouble shooting guide in the Shop Manual. Usually, an inop fuel gauge is a bad ground or contact. It's more rare that the gauge itself or sending unit is bad. Easy enough to test/check though.

First, with battery cable disconnect (ALWAYS) pop off the inspection/access plate on trunk floor which is right above the top of the tank/sending unit. It is a 4-5" ovular plate and ONLY held in by sealing compound. My guess is, it will pop right out with a screwdriver.

From there you can check for broken wires and/or bad-rusty connections. You can also take a VOM and check the resistance value at the posts on the sending unit and see if it is open/closed. Push the back of the car up/down to slosh the gas around and see if the VOM reading changes. If it does, the sending unit is probably ok.

Then, it's either an open wire somewhere running to the dash or something in the dash wiring. Changing out the actual gas gauge is not hard, but you need to disconnect the speedo cable off the governor, drop the steering column, then the dash, and get behind the cluster to swap gauges. And, if you need or have gotten THIS far, replace ALL your dash bulbs (super easy NOW) and attend to those faded/cracked turn signal green colored film inserts. (: Might as well lube the worm gear on the speedo too! Lots of fun stuff to do back there! ARGH!

Call me if you have any questions Dave... Sparks.