What is better the mechanical or electrical oil pressure gauge?

[wazzabie]

What is better the mechanical or electrical oil pressure gauge?

[kipps]

Mechanical is more guaranteed to be accurate, but comes with the greater risk of causing an oil leak itself. I personally prefer electric gauges.

What year is your truck, and what gauge setup do you have currently? If it works, don't fix it.

[Hubscrub]

Both have there advantages. Aftermarket mechanical that use the plastic line can suck if it breaks since it has to bring oil into the cabin of the vehicle. You can get copper line to replace it though. The electrical is ok too just fitting the sender can be a small issue depends where you put it on the block, but you can get fittings to make it work.

[Rickysnickers]

Another vote for electric gauge.

[S10Fan]

I think both are OK depending on the application. I'll add that gauges are like other items, you get what you pay for. I had a set of mechanical gauges made by Sun that were horrible. The temperature gauge had me fighting what I thought was an overheating issue. I finally narrowed the issue down to the gauge and called the manufacturer for tech advice. I was told the gauges have a 20% error range. 20%!! Thats huge! All the gauges were replaced with AutoMeter, problem solved.

[LS short box]

Electrical all the way.

[Accelo]

elect.

[jumpsoffrock]

Mechanical gauge:

Pro: Few parts needed; gauge, oil line, and a couple fittings that are cheap to procure but almost always included with gauge kits. Do not need to have any knowledge of wiring or spend time running wires, just one oil line. The oil fitting to the block is small and rarely is an issue to mount.
Very simple, as long as gauge works and oil line is plumed, you have a reading.

Con: Some folks don't like the threat of oil inside their interior; didn't seem to be much of a threat for hundreds of thousands of 67-72 with factory mech oil gauges.




Electric gauge:

Pro: no oily mess with oil lines.


Cons: #1: some gauge sets do not come with the sender so you must purchase seperately.

#2: you have more points for failure than a mechanical gauge; senders don't last forever(but a good long while), wiring(often people have poor grounds), gauge obviously must work

#3: Some folks claim to be "electrically illiterate" or that they absolutely despise touching wiring. Well you must run a wire for illumination if needed, a positive wire for voltage, a negative wire for ground, and a fourth wire to go to the sender. If you're afraid of wiring, elec gauges are NOT your friend.

#4: Electric oil senders are typically large and bulky and often times are difficult to install or mount, and sometimes need special fitting adapters to allow them to clear engine parts and firewalls.




I am not an electric gauge fan because I love vintage gauges, and rarely if ever do vintage gauges come coupled to a corresponding and working sender. And finding the correct sender for an obscure gauge from 40-70 years ago can be difficult and costly.

[Corts60]

I’m one of those guys who had the mechanical gauge fail and oil dump all over my tan carpet, and my feet…so I’m for electric all the way.

[old Rusty C10]

ive always ran an mechanical gauge with the copper tube ive had electric not work on me