fuel guage problem

[bob_hawke]

driving along the other day, going up a hill on a stinking hot summer day i ran out of freakin petrol out in the country and had to wait for my old man to come around with a jerry can to fill her back up.
my fuel guage just sits on full constantly now no matter how much petrol i have in the tank.. and speaking to an auto electrician he tells me i have to dissemble the fuel tank to get to the actual sensor in the tank.

has anyone had this experience before?
what options do i have of combatting the problem?

any opionions greatly appreciated.

[4hammers]

Hey Bob.
I have exactly the same problem, but haven't got my acxt together to fix. I am assuming it is the sender unit in the tank, as I had another FC with the exact same issue. New sender, all good.
But, it may pay to take it to an auto electrician, as it happened to an XK Falcon I had & when I fitted the new sender ($110 worth), nothing happened. It ended up being the guage.

Rob J

[Dave_EH]

Bob,

If you can get a second hand sender, give it a go as its not hard at all to take the old one out - 15 mins work total.

Otherwise - what Rob said.

Dave

[fe-ute56]

take the wire off the sender and earth it out . if your needle moves to a quarter of a tank it is the sender  cheers danny

[fe-ute56]

i forgot to tell you to do this simple test have your ign on  

[4hammers]

Hi.
I got my act together & tried what Danny suggested, with no joy. Guage stayed on Full. So I pulled the dash out & had a look. Bugger me, if the little wire that has a socket on it to connect to the back of the guage had come off. There was not the slightest bit of shiny brass on the pin (On back of fuel guage) & the socket was as dusty as hell. It makes me think it has been like that for a VERY long time. Julian (The fella who I bought it off) had the car for 10 years & didn't bother fixing it, as it was only a once a month car.
I plugged it back on & voila, I now have a fuel guage. Lucky I didn't pull the sender out!!

Rob J