Accidentally drove while overheated... a little worried

[Saturdee]

Well on my way home my power steering, alternator (I think) and water pump belt that I was planning on replacing very soon broke. So I had to drive about 25 miles to get home, so stupidly I decided to just drive home not thinking anything would happen and after about 10 or so miles I look at my temp guage and it was as high as it could go, so I pulled over real quick. I also noticed that right after the belt went, the battery light and brake light stayed on, idk why.

Anyways, long story short, car got towed home and I drove it overheated and I was just wondering if that would do a lot of damage or none or what, I'm kinda worried, thanks.

 

[johnson512n28]

If your reservoir is overflowing make sure you aren't filling it past the MAX line, which is about halfway up the side. As stated, the bubbles are good - you should sit there and let it run with the cap off to let all the air out, and if your thermostat isn't engaging the temp gauge will surely go above that halfway mark after only driving it a few blocks.

 

[Saturdee]

Okay well I went out and drove it for about 10 minutes, partial highway and partial backroads, and it ran perfectly fine. No excessive smoke coming out of exhaust, coolant overflow wasn't high and I took off the radiator cap and it seemed fine also. I did notice though that for the 10 minutes I was driving, the engine temp didn't even hit a quarter of the way up, but when I was at idle it started going up hit the halfway point. However it is like 30 degrees outside, and I was thinking maybe the reason it didn't heat up when I was driving was because of the wind cooling the engine, and plus 10 minutes isn't THAT long, and at idle maybe it went up because the wind factor wasn't there, letting it heat up. I feel this could be it because when the AC was on I noticed it was blowing cool air, and when it sat it blew warm air, indicating that the engine isn't hot and that the thermostat isn't reading it.

So idk, it's just a hunch. I really am not positive if it's my thermostat that's bad or not.

 

[danl]

Sounds like the motor may be fine if you don't have any air under the rad cap. Some thermostats stick open when they are overheated. You might need a new thermostat so that it will warm up properly.

 

[Saturdee]

Some thermostats stick open when they are overheated. You might need a new thermostat so that it will warm up properly.

Yeah I'll find out when I drive it more if I need a new one or not. Honestly if I do that's fine, if all I got out of all this was a bad thermostat, I'm not complaining at all.