I have been seeing rather high water temps since I put in a rebuilt engine and a new data system. With the old VDO gauge (pre rebuild), I don't think I ever saw it go much beyond 180 degress. With the new sensor (post rebuild), it hits 200 after a couple laps (that seems to be where it stabilizes now) and I've seen a max of a little over 210. Opening up the front radiator inlet and sealing the nose to the shroud to improve exit flow made no difference.

This is with the old block mounted sensor location. Should I covert to the new picilo (?) tube location. Anyone have a good write up / picture of that location?

200-210 is exactly where I am with the old VDO gauge

This is were all of our cars run. 200 to 210. 180 seems low if you are running a thermosat. If correct 195 is when it opens. So it should be running higher temps then 195.

Great. Thanks guys. I was a bit worried. Maybe my old sender, wire, or gauge wasn't quite right which resulted in my low (180 ish) baseline.

If I remember correctly there are two thermostats for our engines. A 180 and a 190. Could be your 1st engine had a 180 and the new one a 190.