rear engine oil temp guage

[rick bell]

all of a sudden lost the rear engine oil temp guage reading.
it went totally to the left(as if the master was off, "cold"). anyone have any ideas. broken wire?. last week had an oil change and they left off the oil fill cap, could have that cap flapping around
damaged the sensor (if it is in that area). took a two hour flight and noticed oil leaking on the hull and it was 1 1/2 qts low.
i never preflight the top oil fill cap on the rear, but it will now.
anyone have any suggestion were to start looking?

[Kim Geyer]

Rick
you oil temp sensor is located at the base of the oil cooler.
If you pull the right cowl off and look on top of the cooler you'll
see the probe between the cooler and the crank case

[GMAs]

Rick had that happen before....

You will probally find the oil temp line broken up on the back of the engine... center backbone looking part... the harness runs up and over the accessory section... and the cap may have whacked the wire or broken it... it is held on by a small bass nut on the temp sensor...and we have seen these come lose also... but, more a broken wire...

The sensor is buried deep into the area at the top of the base of the oil cooler... as kim suggested... it is located on the top side... towards the flange that the accessory section mates up to... its a round thing about the size of the oil pressure sensor on a car... (50 cent piece) and sticks up about 1 inch... with the terminal right in the center... where the small nut goes on... watch out that you don't over torque the nut as you can damage the sensor by twisting it too hard... easy does it... broken wire can be spliced with a crimp insulated electrical splice fitting... as the wire goes all the way back to the inst panel....

Ahhh preflight... is why... things don't happen... GMAs

[SkyKing]

Rick,

Before you rummage around in the rear engine compartment, you just might want to pull the right-side avionics hatch off and take a peek at the connector on the back side of the gauges to make sure that it's completely snug and connected...sometimes they have a tendency to come loose from vibration. Also, if you've had water leaks you could have built-up corrosion on the connector plug that finally rendered the connection nil.

SkyKing

[rick bell]

thank you tomorrow it will dig into it, thany you all for your suggestion, well let you know what i come up with.