Brief Oil Pressure Gauge & Voltmeter Installation Instructions

Craig!

IHI Ibiza Cupra
Jan 6, 2005
1,876
1
Guisborough
www.vagcars.co.uk
I thought some of you may find these few pictures of some use, I know I would have when installing my gauges!

Let’s start with the main factor, choosing your gauge style and where to mount it, in my case I went for some 52mm gauges that will fit in the Cupra R centre console gauges.

gaugeinstall_1.jpg


Next is the electrics, remember your gauges will not come with any wire or fitting. You will need some relatively decent wire for the positive live and earth, however the back lighting can be ran off a finer gauge wire. Also needed is some scotch blocks (unless you choose to cut and soldier in/around the dash areas) and some hooped fittings to attach the wires onto the gauge with.

The wiring can be taken from the headlight switch and dimmer switch area, this allows you to have a switched live supply and a dimmed supply so your gauges match the brightness of your dash lights.

gaugeinstall_2.jpg


First locate the headlamp switch, to remove it from the dash push the switch used to turn the headlights on in and turn it to the right, it will pop in and stay there, now pull on the switch, the whole unit should come out like a cassette.

gaugeinstall_3.jpg


In front of you, you will have the two switches 1 & 2 all the wires will be run off switch 1.

gaugeinstall_4.jpg


The above picture shows which wires you can run your supply off, I choose to take my earth directly off the engine, after all I had to route one wire through the firewall for the oil pressure gauge sender unit, so routing a second one was no problem what so ever.

Next is fitting the oil pressure sensor, first you’ll need to locate the blanking plug which can simply be removed using a 6mm Allen key.

gaugeinstall_5.jpg


Once the blanking plug has been removed you can just screw in the oil pressure sensor, once screwed in your can attach the wire to it. The wire needs to run into the dash area, if you look around the coolant expansion tank area you should be able to see a rubber firewall bung.

You can access this bung by removing the passenger’s side footwell dash trim which is held on by 2 screws, you’ll need a flexible arm but you should be able to just pop it out. I then cut a small hole for the wires, run the wires through it and re-fitted it into the firewall. This means the wires won’t rattle on the metal firewall hole and possibly get sliced and short out and it also ensures no water will get through to the dash area.

These are just the brief key points to installing some gauge’s, other useful tips would be;

- Routing the wires: I found that running the wires from the light switch to the centre console was best done following the current wiring loom, all you need to do is unclip one rubber strap at a time and place the wires into place and re-strap the rubber strap.

- Gauge lighting: The gauges I bought came with some 501 type bulbs and some rubber coloured caps, these colour caps are known to fade over time, and the bulbs blow. So I bought two 6 Cluster 501 Type LED’s this also meant the matched the dash lighting.

Hope I haven’t just wasted my time and this brief guide will help a few people out!
 
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Craig!

IHI Ibiza Cupra
Jan 6, 2005
1,876
1
Guisborough
www.vagcars.co.uk
My main reason for using the scotch blocks was that the gauges could easily be removed without leaving any large bare wire that would need to be taped up. Also the fact that at the time i fitted the gauges the plan was to buy a Cupra as soon as i could afford one ease of removal was took into account.

One other option is to remove the plugs from inside the switch and re-crimp, but the only problem with this is if you damage the plugs beyond repair.
 

ibizacupra

Jack-RIP my little Friend
Jul 25, 2001
31,333
19
glos.uk
very usefull but expensive are the removal tools for the pins. got me a couple of sets... awkward as heck to use, but well handy on the odd time i have to remake connections & splice things in.
 

JONNY BRONCO

Guest
very good instructions,mate. not sure if i am going to attempt it. looks a bit complicated. might end up calling on my friendly mechanic for that! spoke to seat and you can buy the wiring loom for 38 quid. do you think its worth getting?
 

flashbsd

Guest
what wiring loom is that jonny? somewhere there will still need to be a oil sender screwed into the engine.

That guide is good, but if you attempt it on a 20VT, you will have serious trouble in getting your hand / tool down to un do that bolt where the sender unit screws in!
 

JONNY BRONCO

Guest
the wiring loom for the original gauges that come as standard on the cupra r. i must admit that car electrics arent my strong point but i assumed that having a wiring loom to start off with would be a step in the right direction?
 

cuprabaz

Racing 2020VT
Jun 22, 2004
2,357
1
Aberdeenshire
Is the Switched Live the ignition live = 12v? I take it the backlight + is also 12V and is for the dash lights etc.

So i'd be best off wiring my gauges into the switched so the gauges work as soon as the ignitions on, or am i miles off. :confused:
 

Deleted member 9043

Guest
are there more places on 1.8t where you can put a sensor? and what size bolt(sensor you need for this?)
 

Craig!

IHI Ibiza Cupra
Jan 6, 2005
1,876
1
Guisborough
www.vagcars.co.uk
Baz - The gauge will have +VE, -VE, Backlight +VE, Backlight -VE and Sensor. The main guage needs to be run off switched live, this way your gauges (and lighting) work when the ignition is switched on. The backlighting is ran from the light switch because it's a dipped supply so you can use the dimmer switch on the gauges, thus making it match the OEM set up.
 

bucky boy

mk3 ibiza cupra owner
Jan 27, 2005
206
0
scotland
so in my tim gauges i have a red and black wire for the backlight mate so the red goes to the backlight + and the red to backlight - and the switched live is for the oil pressure gauge.
 

Bizacup20vt

Guest
good thread craig, agree that the oil pressure unit is hard to screw in cause not much room but all the other stuff is spot on and helped me out loads. thanks and................rock on brunther!!!!!!!!!!!
 

Craig!

IHI Ibiza Cupra
Jan 6, 2005
1,876
1
Guisborough
www.vagcars.co.uk
Done Oil Temp... see my other thread! This is what I mean I've got two seperate threads one from bits of the 1.6 and one from bits of the Cupra install.

Will make a complete guide later since it's proving useful at the moment. May even bo a quick boost gauge one too!
 
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