TylerW
New Member
A year or so ago I bought a new gas tank and a new sending unit for a 1965-66 C-body for Van's Auto. I have purchased many items from Van's that worked well, so this is not a bash thread. However, I had problems with these two items, enough so that I would hold off on buying either until they get it sorted.
This first issue I encountered was that the sending unit died after 10 months/ 100 miles. I drove the car very little this past year while working on other issues. While driving along, I looked down and noticed the gas needle was all the way past full, although it only had about 6 gallons of gas on board.
I pulled the tank back out and removed the sending unit, and that's when I noticed the sending unit was installed 30 degrees too far counter-clockwise. That caused the float to no longer be parallel with the bottom of the tank. I thought this was my fault from being in a hurry to get things installed. I also noticed that the sending unit arm was tweaked, again causing the float to not be exactly parallel with the tank floor even when installed correctly.
I tested the wiring on the car and the gauge and everything passed. I tested the sending unit and it failed with a near-dead short to ground. I contacted Van's, they said return it, which i did. The man there called me a couple days later and said the sending unit worked, but was slightly low on the low side. I called BS on that and challenged him(politely) to guarantee that the sending unit would work fine when it arrived back here. At that point they offered a new unit, which I accepted.
The new unit arrived and I unboxed it and tested it. The first thing i noticed is that the float arm was again tweaked, but not as bad as the first one. I tested it and it ran the scale as it should, except that it went too high on the high side and too low on the low side. I could live with that, so I proceeded to install it. This is where I discovered a big problem:
When I put the sender in, I realized that either the locating tabs on the sending unit were located in the wrong place, or the locating slots in the tank were. I no longer have my original tank to compare to. Either way, as designed, the sending unit will not sit in the tank so that the float is parallel to the tank floor. I wasn't about to spend another $15 to ship something back again, so I bent the tabs down so that I could clock the sending unit correctly. That didn't work either!
It turns out that the sending unit pickup tube hits the bottom of the gas tank when it is clocked correctly. By correctly, I mean where the float is LEVEL. maybe I'm missing something here but in my experience, floats are always intended to be LEVEL.
I took the sender back out, removed the strainer and carefully bent the pickup tube upward. That worked, but I no longer have positive retainment of the sending unit aside from the lockring. I am used to poorly done reproduction parts, but this is too much. I emailed Van's to alert them to this and never heard anything back. I am over $400 into these items and this is unacceptable. If this sending unit fails also I will either go to another supplier for another version of the same lousy sender, or carry a measuring stick with me.
Just a heads-up.
This first issue I encountered was that the sending unit died after 10 months/ 100 miles. I drove the car very little this past year while working on other issues. While driving along, I looked down and noticed the gas needle was all the way past full, although it only had about 6 gallons of gas on board.
I pulled the tank back out and removed the sending unit, and that's when I noticed the sending unit was installed 30 degrees too far counter-clockwise. That caused the float to no longer be parallel with the bottom of the tank. I thought this was my fault from being in a hurry to get things installed. I also noticed that the sending unit arm was tweaked, again causing the float to not be exactly parallel with the tank floor even when installed correctly.
I tested the wiring on the car and the gauge and everything passed. I tested the sending unit and it failed with a near-dead short to ground. I contacted Van's, they said return it, which i did. The man there called me a couple days later and said the sending unit worked, but was slightly low on the low side. I called BS on that and challenged him(politely) to guarantee that the sending unit would work fine when it arrived back here. At that point they offered a new unit, which I accepted.
The new unit arrived and I unboxed it and tested it. The first thing i noticed is that the float arm was again tweaked, but not as bad as the first one. I tested it and it ran the scale as it should, except that it went too high on the high side and too low on the low side. I could live with that, so I proceeded to install it. This is where I discovered a big problem:
When I put the sender in, I realized that either the locating tabs on the sending unit were located in the wrong place, or the locating slots in the tank were. I no longer have my original tank to compare to. Either way, as designed, the sending unit will not sit in the tank so that the float is parallel to the tank floor. I wasn't about to spend another $15 to ship something back again, so I bent the tabs down so that I could clock the sending unit correctly. That didn't work either!
It turns out that the sending unit pickup tube hits the bottom of the gas tank when it is clocked correctly. By correctly, I mean where the float is LEVEL. maybe I'm missing something here but in my experience, floats are always intended to be LEVEL.
I took the sender back out, removed the strainer and carefully bent the pickup tube upward. That worked, but I no longer have positive retainment of the sending unit aside from the lockring. I am used to poorly done reproduction parts, but this is too much. I emailed Van's to alert them to this and never heard anything back. I am over $400 into these items and this is unacceptable. If this sending unit fails also I will either go to another supplier for another version of the same lousy sender, or carry a measuring stick with me.
Just a heads-up.
