Club 80-90 Forums

Hi
Relates to a 2.0 l aircold
Just fitted an oil temp gauge pressure gauge + a tacho to keep an eye on what the engine is doing, last weekend the battery was dead, used a spare I had , charged up the original and went to fit it last night and the battery in the van dead again.
I put in the charged one and noticed the VDO were not back to their stops, pulled the +ve supply leads off and they dropped to the stops, is this the source of the battery drain, feed for gauges is taken off an ignition on- live .

Is earthing of the gauges the problem ???

Ta Mike

Yep, they are the source of the drain. You need to wire them into the switched live side of the ignition, not the permanent live feed in from the battery. Change this over and you should be fine.

Check that the live feed switches off with the ignition with a multimeter. Looks like you have the wrong feed.

There's a thin black lead (thinner than the rest anyway!) that comes from the ignition switch. That lead supplies the standard dashboard guages. Coming off that one should solve your problems hopefully.