engine temps slowly climb and climb and climb

[mywhite89]

After doing all the engine work to the car we have a engine cooling problem. Cooling fans kick on when I see around 198f at the housing. The longer you drive whether you drive nice or not the engine temps keep climbing past M. After it gets that hot I see 215-220f at the t-stat housing. Run the heater on high when it gets their and that helps contain it.

Initially today, it seemed as though my problem was with the cooling system building pressure because I took the cap off when hot and there was no pressure. I elevated the front of the car and made sure any possible air pocket at left the system. Drove the car, still getting hot and now it does have good pressure when I released the cap a bit. No air that I could hear escape just fluid.

I'm letting the car cool and I'm going to pull the 180F t-stat to test it. I have a new 180 to go in. I have tested both coolant sensors and replaced the dummy gauge one, they are both fine and prove similar temps that I see at the housing.

What do you think we have going on? I'm pretty sure I installed correctly, springs go toward the engine. Kind of acts like the stat opens but not all the way. Hope I can find it, otherwise we race one at a time and let it cool for a bit.

Chris

[XR7 Dave]

Make sure that you have a high flow 180 deg thermostat and confirm that it works.

Your FMIC is blocking a lot of air. Make sure you have enough airflow. Do you have dual fans?

Make sure you have no air pockets. Jacking the front of the car up is not the way to do this. Install a lever release 13lb radiator cap. Then cycle the motor warm, then lift the lever to allow air to escape into the overflow. Allow engine to cool and draw fluid back into the motor. Do this until no air bubbles come up in the overflow.

[mywhite89]

Originally Posted by XR7 Dave

Make sure that you have a high flow 180 deg thermostat and confirm that it works.

Your FMIC is blocking a lot of air. Make sure you have enough airflow. Do you have dual fans?

Make sure you have no air pockets. Jacking the front of the car up is not the way to do this. Install a lever release 13lb radiator cap. Then cycle the motor warm, then lift the lever to allow air to escape into the overflow. Allow engine to cool and draw fluid back into the motor. Do this until no air bubbles come up in the overflow.

Car has fan in front of radiator and another on the engine side of fmic. It used to have 2 fans fmic. I removed 1 fan along with removing 1 air restricting trans cooler and the ac condensor, decided that would even things out. This radiator is much better and has less restriction than the setup on my 89 car, not saying that solves my problem....

I got another 180 t-stat from napa which I compared with the old one. Both work the same. Not sure what a high flow 180 degree stat is, maybe thats what I have??? Here's a picture of what I have, heated up and open. Noticed some movement at 185-190 degrees

[mywhite89]

Ok, I looked up a high flow t-stat. Guess I need to find one tomorrow, but I didn't have the problem before with a regular so Im assuming I am fighting an air pocket in the system.

Dave what you are saying is I need to do several heat up and cool down cycles with the car level and see what happens? The radiator I have is aftermarket, hopefully I can find a cap to fit it. Just a stupid question, does this happen to you a lot on these cars? I havent ever had the problem on my 89 and I've had that system open more times than I care to think about.

Chris

[rzimmerl]

You can get a high flow tstat at Advance Auto, Mr. Gasket brand around 10 bucks.

[mywhite89]

Originally Posted by rzimmerl

You can get a high flow tstat at Advance Auto, Mr. Gasket brand around 10 bucks.

Thanks for the heads-up. I'll be grabbing one up today.

Chris

[David Neibert]

Originally Posted by rzimmerl

You can get a high flow tstat at Advance Auto, Mr. Gasket brand around 10 bucks.

That's the same thermostat I'm using. To make bleeding the air a little easier, I drilled a small hole in mine.

David