Fuel gauge problem

[AndreJ]

Hi
My name is Andre Joubert
I have 2001 Gen 3 Pajero 3.5 LWB
Very happy with it except 1 problem, my fuel gauge is working when it wants to, sometimes even 10 minutes after I started driving it starts to come alive then goes right up to the full position en slowly settles to where it should be, do you guys think this problem is in the float or the fuel gauge or the pc board behind the dials
Any help will be appreciated

[Paj]

could be your fuel sender unit, my cars doing the same. i have a NL but i would presume they would use the same unit.

will most probably have a bit of shit on the touching surface or the wire may not have good contact. can be as simple as pull the unit outclean the sensing face and possibly if required bend the wire a touch to achieve good contact again.

will be doing this on mine tomorrow so hopefully fixes the issue.

cheers dan

[AndreJ]

Hi Paj
Thanks for the info , is it possible to do this without dropping the fuel tank

[TRyan4]

Not sure about the petrol,but the diesel is accessed through a small panel on the floor behind the front seat on the left looking from the front of the vehicle, where the second row passengers put their feet,it's under the floor covering.

[jjacer]

G'day,mate there is a well known issue with the gauge cluster pc board on these models, although it usually seems to affect the temp gauge more so than fuel gauge but it has been known to affect both.
The fix is to have the board replaced by MM but this is quite expensive-what a surprise eh.The other way is to send the gauge away for repair-I was quoted $250 but the deal breaker was the 2 weeks it takes.
Either way it's a real pain but a well known issue all the same.Having said that it could be a problem with the sender which is of course in tank.
Funnily enough I just had my radiator flushed etc and the mechanic was dead certain it wasn't my gauges but just the sender unit-more wasted bucks later and shock , surprise it is still the gauge cluster issue.it is amazing how many Mitsu 'specialists' still don't seem to know about this very common issue and merrily go about replacing this and that at your expense to no avail.

[AndreJ]

ok , so this is what I did.
First remove the middle seats

Then remove the A/C vents from the carpet and the top cover plate for the fuel pump that sits under the seats.
Then rol up the carpet and you will find the cover for the fuel sending unit
about in the middle where your feet goes when you sit on the seats
Unscrew the cover and unscrew the sender unit , unplug and slowly pull it out.
you need to take off the metal plate to get to the thingy that goes up and down , I just cleaned it and sprayed some electro clean on the parts and then tested it to see if it works.
while testing move the flout up and down too see if you get different readings ( must be pluged in and car ignition on- not started)
you can then also test to see if your fuel light works.
That seem to did the trick , its working again 100%

[Catchin Jack]

Reviving an old post here but today while driving my diesel just stopped, no fuel warning light, and it said i had a quarter tank left but I was out of fuel, any ideas what it may be, sender unit maybe?

Cheers
Leo

[Shano592]

Could be a sticky float switch.

Mine is the opposite. Says empty when I have 20 litres still to go.

[captain_paj]

Reviving an old post here but today while driving my diesel just stopped, no fuel warning light, and it said i had a quarter tank left but I was out of fuel, any ideas what it may be, sender unit maybe?

Cheers
Leo

When you say "out of fuel" - how did you know? Did you check the tank, or was it based on having empty fuel lines?

[Catchin Jack]

Added 20 litres, drove 1 minute up the road and filled up with 60 litres. I'd say it was empty but was showing a quarter tank left.

Leo

[MTN-KAT]

Could be a sticky float switch.

Mine is the opposite. Says empty when I have 20 litres still to go.

That's a safety feature. So you don't get caught with no fuel. Plus prevents fuel pump running hot from lack of cooling by fuel so it don't burn out prematurely.

[captain_paj]

Added 20 litres, drove 1 minute up the road and filled up with 60 litres. I'd say it was empty but was showing a quarter tank left.

Leo

Size of tank is....???

Did the gauge move when you put the 20L in?

[Catchin Jack]

90L tank apparently according to MM. Once I filled it up the gauge went up.

[El_Freddo]

Thread dig!

Just had this issue on our second NP - still relatively new to us. It stalled several times but Mrs El_Freddo managed to get it to our driveway for me to check out once home. I had that sinking feeling that it’s the dreaded diesel injection pump issue.

Turned out to be no fuel - even though the gauge was below 1/4 but higher than 1/8th. I added 40L of diesel, the gauge came up and the NP ran as it always has since we got it on the road.

I was surprised it still started even though it was out of fuel, it didn’t want to idle at times but with some foot in the throttle it would rev and hold fine - not that I did that for long.

Now to look into the trick AndreJ talks about above. This NP sat for some time with a low tank before we got it going again, so I suspect that’s part of the cause of this issue.

Cheers

Bennie

[Dazzawhipple]

need to solder the back of the fuel gauge search youtube fir the method, its very easy