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Fuel gauge woes on my '69 Chevy truck.

1634 Views 9 Replies 3 Participants Last post by  Rich-L79, 
Rich-L79
When the truck is turned on (doesn't have to be running) the fuel gauge works fine and reads accurately, but when I turn the truck off, the gauge needle drops down below empty. The needle can take a few seconds to "warm up" when I turn on the truck, just yesterday the needle was stuck below empty but moved up to register the tank contents when I rapped on the gauge lens.

What's at fault here? What is the fix? This has to be something fairly simple I'm guessing since the gauge works fine when the ignition switch is on. Previously the needle registerd the appropriate tank contents whether the ignition was on or off.
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Coppertop
In addition to what John stated, there is also some residual magnetism in the movement of the guage. There are two opposing coils which create eletromagnetic fields to operate the movement of the needle. My '70 can literally sit for 6-8 months with no power connections what so ever and the needle will stay put exactly where it was when the car was running. Only slowly will it start to "droop" towards "E" after so long. I call it "guage memory".


**Also Rich, if you could please call me tonite I'd appreciate it as I've got some news for you!

Joe
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