w201 Misleading gauges

[blue190]

Hello to you all, just returned to this fine forum after a spell in the wilderness that is not owning a merc. Recently purchased a 93L 190e 2.0 off of fleabay for a little over 400 quid, not perfect by any means, but its straight, drives nice and is reasonably clean too. The only gripes I have are the fuel and temperature gauges having minds of their own. The fuel gauge will read full most of the time and will very occasionally give you the true reading for a short time before returning to full, tank sender problem maybe? or could it be wiring fault somewhere? The temp gauge however reads normal ie just above 80 while in normal driving, but after being parked for a short time then started again it will shoot up almost to red then hover around the white mark before the red then shoot back to the 80 sort of area again. The previous owner had a new thermostat fitted for last mot in jan of this year, so i wouldn't like to think it was a problem with that. Temp sensor problem? Anyone any other ideas on this before i start taking electric bits apart? Thank you in advance for any help.

 

[GordonTarling]

Sorry, I can't help you much with the fuel gauge problem - as you say, probably sender unit or wiring. However the temp gauge 'problem' sounds fairly normal to me - the higher temp after you restart is caused by heat soak. As long as it goes back to normal fairly soon after restarting and is normal otherwise, then I wouldn't worry about it.