Sounds reasonable to me.
I think the majority of UK's GA fleet has no engine temperature monitoring. Some have a useless CHT gauge. One IR instructor I flew with recently told me to go by the oil temperature gauge...
The price paid for lack of instrumentation is the need for ultra conservative fuel practices.
I too lean on the ground, to the point where the engine starts to pack up. No way could one get airborne with that in error - in fact one can't even taxi on grass with it.