Anyone have/know of any issues with the Temperature display for the Outside Temp?

Mine seems to intermitently (sp?) be off by around 6 degrees. Today it is 48 degrees this morning and my temp on the display read 54. Yesterday it worked fine, but the day before it was 67 and it read 73. it's on and off when it wants to be incorrect.

Could it be some sort of sensor malfunction? And is that guage tied into any other important temp guages inside the engine? (I don't know crap about technical stuff lol)

 

the sensor is located in the front nose of the driver side. a little black thing sticking out right under the front brace.

if your car has been driven, the temp will go off cuz all the hot air "coming" from the back of the sensor.

 

As nycgps cites, it's probably just heat migration (heat always moves to cold and therefore engine block or solar load heat to the OA sensor).

You can only count on the gauged temp to be relatively accurate when the car is moving for awhile after sitting. Even then, it's not all that accurate, as most vehicle temp sensors are not.

 

mine is pretty accurate

YMMV of course

 

gotchya. You would think they would put it away from the engine so that you can get a more acurate reading of the outside temperature lol. and YMMV? I don't know what that means. Is it a different type of Sensor?

 

They actually have. It's at the leading edge of the relative airflow when the car is moving, upstream of any vehicle heat sources. I s'pose they could mount it on a boom six feet in front of the car.

Your Mileage May Vary (YMMV; in other words you may be blessed with a better sensor, or not).

 

I actually meant why can't they mount the sensor above the windshield, or above the rear windshield, etc. elswear on the vehicle no where near the engine. Doesn't make sense to me.

 

'cause it ain't that important.

 

I know that. You know that... but we both know how boys love their toys no matter how tiny and insunifigant the gadget is

 

Yeah, I hear ya. I'm a man of science myself. But they have to keep the cost down somewhere and the OA sensor really isn't that important on the grand scale of things. Now, why can't I have a per tire PSI readout? The TPMS is transmitting the data, we just don't have a readout for it. Even my lowly Jeep Patriot displays the PSI state of all four tires. I need to know!!

 

Really? Now I wish mine did too!!! hrmph... lol

 

350z has it

 

yeah y we can't have it tell us which tire is low?? huh that is crazy.....i guess they are looking out for our health so we will get some exercise walking around and checking all the air pressure

 

Makes ya check'em all don't it?

 

Those locations would have major problems with heat from the sun, convection of engine heat while moving, plus as the air flows around the car's body there is a boundary layer you'd have to penetrate to get an accurate reading. The current location makes a lot of sense. It only takes a few minutes of driving for it to adjust to ambient and it's easy enough to see when the temp reading stops changing.