Car Overheated / Overheating / Overheats [MERGED]

[NTRCOOL]

OVERHEATING? The issues and their solutions have remained the same- either you don't have enough cool air reaching the rad, there's a cooling system obstruction which is preventing coolant from circulating, or your head gasket has failed and is allowing coolant to be consumed or pushed away from the engine.

Discuss all possible overheating problems and solutions here.


OK,
I just left my house to go over to my GF's,and happen to look down and see my needle right before the red mark. This just happened out of nowhere. I stop the car as quickly as i can, and pour in some coolant(Coolant a little low). Still same thing. Welp im in the middle of the road, and HAD to get it home. Im only 5 min from my house. I decided to try and make it(I really had no other choice). Welp I drive no faster than 20mph, and the temp needle is BARELY into the red the whole way.And occasionaly to the left of it. Am I ok?? Do ya think any damage was done?? And im thinking either thermostat, or water pump. For each of those, whats a round about $$ figure to get replaced?? Any info you have would be GREATLY appreciated!

 

[fastclip]

Hey it is something simple and it stopped my smoking, I blew my stock turbo, well after words my car kept smoking, and someone told me hey changed the PCV valve. And sure enough it stopped smoking and actually ran a little bit better. So just an FYI if everything else is coming back good, and they are pretty cheap

 

[dan2288]

Ill try the PCV valve. But i think the headgaskets good bc we did a compression test and it was good. I forget the numbers bc my dad did it, but it was real good.

 

[Drift_Kit_Laser]

i would look at your pvc valve and hose. I had a problem after i installed a new head on my mine the pcv hose had a hairline crack and the tiniest bit of oil residue was coming out and would burn off on top of the valve cover.That should atleast help the smell of burning oil. It worked for me.

 

[HustlerTalon]

I am originally from norcal but moved here to LA about 2 months ago and I have had issues with my talon overheating...at first I just thought it was the 100+ degree weather but recently its been in the high 70s, low 80s and my car overheats like a motha...especially in bumper to bumper traffic.

My setup is this:
Fluidyne Radiator
2 slim fans (one in the front of the radiator, one in the back)
NO thermostat
NO resovoir tank

I am thinking that the cap might have gone bad, though I never had problems with it before, nor with this setup.

Fans should be pulling air into the radiator from outside right?
Thermostat?? which one?
how should I setup the resovoir tank??? (never used one)


Now I am forced to only drive the car in the night!

 

[hopwoodp]

That is pretty abnormal for our area. You may have a bad radiator cap, water pump or not enough coolant. Replace the cap first, esp if it looks old. You want a coolant resovoir tank as well. You need to monitor your coolant levels.

 

[Locke]

Don't forget to check that the fans are turning on as they should, if you haven't already.

 

[silver bullit]

Check your fans, replace cap. Also check the inspection hole on the water pump to see if it leaking.

 

[HustlerTalon]

the cap is a bit old...the water pump only has about 3,000 miles on it...the fans turn on and off with the car.....so with the resovoir tank, one hose goes from the top of the housing by the cap to the tank, and the other hose goes from the tank to the atmosphere, right? or what????

what about the thermostat??? no thermostat in my car, problem or not?

 

[silver bullit]

Are your fans pushing or pulling air into the radiator? Make sure that you dont have the fan backwards so it is pushin/pulling air out of engine bay into the front of the car.

 

[synthetek]

the cap is a bit old...the water pump only has about 3,000 miles on it...the fans turn on and off with the car.....so with the resovoir tank, one hose goes from the top of the housing by the cap to the tank, and the other hose goes from the tank to the atmosphere, right? or what????

what about the thermostat??? no thermostat in my car, problem or not?

Is the nipple by radiator cap where the coolant reservoir is supposed to go capped off? you are supposed to have the coolant reservoir so when the coolant gets hot & expands it can let some out in the reservoir then when it cools it sucks it back in. If there is no reservoir it you will loose coolant when it gets hot (or have no way to release the pressure if the nipple is plugged or no way to release air from the cooling system) and it will suck air into the cooling system when it cools down. Are you loosing coolant? I would try a new cap & setting up the coolant overflow reservoir. I don't think the thermostat is the problem that just makes it take longer to warm up but its not that cold here anyway.

 

[SOADweskey]

+1 for what everyone has been saying. You can get a generic overflow tank from Kragen or any other autoparts store if you don't have your stock one. And as for the water lines to it make sure that the one that runs from the thermostat housing below the cap goes to the bottom of the overflow tank and the one that goes to atmosphere is open to the top of the overflow tank.

I think you should run a thermostat because it helps to keep your car at the proper operating temperature. I would run the stock thermostat or one that opens slightly cooler than that.

 

[dan2288]

Im just hoping the catch can will help. Instead of having the hoses from the valve cover go to the intake, they'll be hooked up to the catch can. I did find oil in the intake, so maybe the turbo was pulling oil from the valve cover from one of those hoses.

 

[kingjust]

Ok so my car overheated and now its burning oil pretty bad. At idle it will smoke and when u rev it up, it gets worse. The color of the smoke is whitish/grey and it smells like oil. We did a compression test and it was good so the headgaskets good. Did a leakdown test and it was good. Checked the valve stem seals and their fine. Im running out of ideas guys !! Im putting in a catch can soon and maybe that will help bc there was oil drops in the intake pipe. And btw, the turbos good bc it was sent to forced performance and they looked it over and said it was fine. So does anybody have any ideas ?

Since you overheated, depending on how bad it got, you could have cracked the block or head. White smoke equals coolant/water, blue smoke is oil. I'm not trying to say that you have to get a new block, but if you did all of the prelimenary diagnosis correctly like you stated, that would be the only thing left. And also, if it's the color you say it is with the smell, most definitely a crack in the block could be mixing oil with coolant. One of your oil galleys could be jacked mixing with the coolant, and then the coolant seeping in to the compression chamber. You might, want to break it down and get it magnufluxed.

KJ

 

[pooker]

I know you said your compression was good, but what were your actual numbers across the board?

 

[dan2288]

not in order- 210 210 210 190
my dad did the test and he didnt tell me the order, just the numbers

 

[Talonracn50]

Compression really doesnt tell the whole story -- you need to do a leak down test.

 

[dan2288]

did a leak down test too haha. Everything looked good. We thought it might be the valve stem seals so thats why we did it, but they were good. My dad even took a look at them and they were fine.

 

[Eclipsegst2312]

yep... i agree sounds like a bad head gasket

 

[dan2288]

Ok, but why would there be oil in the intake and turbo when the turbo is in good condition. My quess is that its sucking oil from the valve cover from one of the two hoses that are connected to the intake from the valve cover. Could that even be possible? Could it be a bad PCV valve or whats the other hose for ?

 

[turboking15]

dont get tunnel vision when problems like this come up.
it could be more than one thing, the smell and oil in the intake could very well be from the pcv valve or lack of a catch can. but if you are getting that much oil in the intake i would say that you are getting some serious blow by, meaning piston rings. also like previously stated white smoke equals water. especially after overheating i would replace the head gasket no matter what and check the mating surfaces to make sure you didnt warp anything.
like i said could be more than one thing wrong.

 

[antiheroX]

You may ahve cracked either the block or the head.
Sorry to say but time for a teardown.

 

[dan2288]

You may ahve cracked either the block or the head.
Sorry to say but time for a teardown.

damn, dont say that haha. I hope its nothing that serious.

 

[HustlerTalon]

And as for the water lines to it make sure that the one that runs from the thermostat housing below the cap goes to the bottom of the overflow tank and the one that goes to atmosphere is open to the top of the overflow tank.

So one line on the bottom and the other on the top of the overflow tank??? what if both nipples on the overflow tank are in the top??? will that be ok? I am just saying because I have an oil catch can that I have never installed on the car and could use it as an overflow tank.


Thanks guys.

 

[turboking15]

if not a teardown you at least need to take off the head and check that stuff out.

 

[turbosax2]

Autozone carries $9 overflow tanks that work just fine. They're clear plastic and have a red cap. I'll find a link for you later.

Edit: http://www.partsamerica.com/ProductDetail.aspx?MfrCode=IDN&MfrPartNumber=MCR3&CategoryCode=3052