Old style rocker covers with temperature sensor mount?

[al_roethlisberger]

I was leisurely browsing around eBay looking at various things, including used MG parts, and noticed something that I had noted years before but don't recall I ever asked about.

Some of the older MG valve/rocker covers have a hole (slot seen on the cover on the right in the photo below) for mounting what appears to be a temperature sensor in the valve cover, which of course our V11 series does not have mounted there.

The mounting looks the same as our airbox air temperature sensor, and I think I've even seen on of these covers with a sensor mounted that looks identical to our air temperature sensor.  So I wondered if the valve/rocker cover mounted version was for oil/head temperature sensing as a previous approach to the cylinder temperature sensor we have bolted into our V11 cylinder?

Just was curious what that sensor did in this application and era.

 

 

[Pressureangle]

temperature sensor on my '97 1100 Sport-i. I think it's 'oil' temp but indicates general engine temp to the ECU.