I need some help. My car has been running a little hot lately. I heard something about an aftermarket cooling temperture sensor. It makes it so that the fans turn on earlier than the stock set up. Little light on this issue will help.
This is what I was looking at. I just wanted to make sure I was on the same page as most.
Russ,
The temperature gauge has been alittle high for while. I was one of the only ones running really hot on our last cruise. When we went on our own, Mike and I had to pull over for a little to cool me down. Going on the Rim of the world cruise and I want to make a change to see the difference.
The stock cooling system should be adequate to keep the engine cool. If it is overheating with the stock system, you need to fix the problems before throwing parts at it. Is your cooling system clean internally? Take off your air cleaner and move your a/c condenser out of the way to make sure you have nothing between the condenser and radiator blocking air flow. Put a hose behind your radiator and back flush the fins to get any debris out of the fins. Also make sure your air dam is in place. The switch in combination with a 180 degree t'stat may then help. If you have other problems with the cooling system, the fan switch and lower t'stat won't make any difference. We had another member of the club back in the late 1990's with a T/A who had an overheating problem. He seemed to throw everything he could think of at it. After changing out the water pump, t'stat, fan switch, and flushing the cooling system, he decided to install a new radiator. When he removed the condenser in the process of getting ready to take out the radiator, he found a plastic shopping bag had slipped up between the condenser and radiator blocking about 90% of the air flow through the radiator! He removed the bag and put it back together, problem solved!
Yeah. My problem is not major though. I just changed the radiator about a month ago and it helped some. I have checked everything else.
The car is not always running hot and it has not really "over heated". It just seems to warm at times. I know that the temperature rises with the altitude but i dont think it should rise that much. I just think that if the fans would turn on sooner it wouldnt be running so warm.
my car spent about 12 years in the PNW before i bought it. there were leaves and road dirt blocking over 1/2 of my flow between the condenser and radiator.
Did you do an engine cooling system flush when you changed your radiator? Is the engine temp running hotter than it did when you first got the car, or just going up a bit when we go to the desert or at higher ambient temp. situations? If it is still cooling as good as new, but you would like it to run a little cooler in extreme conditions, the fan switch with a 180 degree t'stat would be the way to go. You need the 180 degree t'stat to go with the fan switch because with a 195 degree t'stat, you will have a t'stat trying to maintain 195 degrees while the fan is trying to maintain 180 degrees in the engine.
I have the 180 degree t'stat and a 180 degree fan switch that we picked up at Turbo City, and once my car warms up, the temp stays between 180 degrees and 220 degrees. I haven't repaired my a/c, yet, so I don't know how hot it will run with a/c working.
