Thanks for all your suggestions.......I'll post my results following my weekend repair efforts.

One more bit of info....in addition to the dead fuel gage the clock is dead and so is the tach. I saw a post on replacing the capasitors on the clock, I plan on doing that. I imagine the tach is related to the cable. Speedo works.

I tend to discount any electrical grounding issues since the temp. gage functions properly. So too does the oil pressure gage but I realize that works directly off of an oil line to the gage.