INTERPOL TEMP GAUGE

[shepjock]

As stated in "oils for Interpol 2" the temp gauge on my newly bought IP2 was out of order:the general opinion was ,it seems, that I had a problem with no solution so I looked for an alternative.Rotax make ,among other things, 2 stroke air cooled engines for microlights and ploughing through catalogues I found a thermocouple and gauge for those engines.The beauty of their system is that the thermocouple is connected to to a copper washer that sits under the sparkplug and therefore can be fitted to any engine. Order was placed and on opening the box I found the first hurdle:the washer is for a 14mm plug not a 10mm one ! The heatshrink sleeve was carefully cut of to show that the washer was only crimped on to the wires : it took two seconds to undo and crimp on another washer with a 1Omm hole in it and re-heatshrink a sleeve. Second hurdle was screwing the spark plug back on as the wires are stiff and the threaded hole a long way down in the engine,I had to bend the washer by 90 ° where it is crimped on to the wires.Third hurdle is where to fit the new gauge which is 58 mm in diameter and will not replace the original one : for testing I jury rigged it to the speedo with tape.Result ?? As far as I can tell ,perfect ! The gauge registers from 20°C to 300° and on a fairly hot summer day (July in the south of France) the temp was 160° running the bike at 6000rpm on a motorway falling to 140° when slowing down.( Does this sound normal to the rotary experts ?) I have now fitted the gauge neatly into the fairing and coiled up the wires because I was told not to shorten them. The thermocouple and gauge are a J type and were bought in France(110 £ incl vat) from a company called AVIREX.fr but I'm certain any number of UK companies sell the same stuff if you can't stand the french...

[Interpol2471]

Well done what a good solution.My IP2 normally runs between 110c and 150c on UK roads depending on traffic and my right hand

[Interpol2471]

Have you got a picture for the gallery?

[johnbirchjar]

Reading the two previous entries my Classic run about "par for the course" never seen 160c yet(don't wish to) thank's for the info on the position of the thurmocoupling Richard,I guess that it must be hidden behind the cover for the air filter & coils,I will take it off and have a look,I took the old girl out for a bit of a blast on Saturday and the gauge shows a cooler running temp by about 15c,coincidence? J.B.

[gripper]

Gutsy move, paying £110 for something then taking a knife/pliers/etc to it to make it work.

[shepjock]

I would have been delighted if somebody had given me a better solution for fixing a temp gauge to an air cooled Norton;would have saved some cash and two minutes with a pair of pliers to crimple a connector.