Is my temperature gauge high?

Here is mine. It looks like a little over 9 o'clock .

 

running hotter than optimal temp probably

 

Fluid doesn't flow uniformly throughout the radiator. Air doesn't flow uniformly through the radiator either. Take the temps at different places, you'll get different readings. The temperature gauge shouldn't be used to determine temperature. That's why it doesn't show anything besides Cold/Normal/Hot. If the needle is pretty much anywhere between C and H, it's in the normal range. It's just a needle version of an uh-oh light. If the light's not on, it's not saying uh-oh. As long as the needle isn't close to H, there's not a problem.

The OP's engine should have a 180 degree thermostat, which means it *starts* opening *around* 180, and the normal temp range for that engine IIRC is up to 205 degrees. If you're under a real heavy load on a hot day and the needle is really climbing, throttle back a bit. If you're sitting on a cold day with light load and it's climbing like crazy, be concerned. If it's anywhere else and sitting steady, nothing to concern yourself about.

It's barely different from the oil gauges in most vehicles anymore. They hook directly to a pressure switch that either is open or closed. if you have 4psi of oil pressure it reads normal, if there's less it doesn't. But there is no way to know what the oil pressure actually is, besides bare minimum or not bare minimum, without using a different tool to take the readings.

 

I got the reading 194f of the coolant Temp, that mean is normal, right?

 

This is where mine has run for the last 200,000 miles. The needle position is actually one of the first things I noticed when I test drove and bought it. The dealership scanned it and confirmed it was normal temperature even though the gauge appeared very slightly elevated.

 

Yup, normal range

 

I have the scan gauge and noticed that from 180-215 my needle doesn't move at all