yeah you heard right.. i live in SoCal. and tonight the temp was 50* at night.. i live by the ocean as well. so heres the short story,

i bought the car in San Diego on monday and drove it home, it was 55* at night.. and the whole way back to Orange County(87 miles) the temp was fine... (210*).. until i got 5 miles from home the temp started to rise... all the way to the 1st redline.. and i was doing 80 miles an hour!!! that should be more than enough air flow to cool it.. got home, shut it down and let it cool off.. the guy just replaced the radiator, brand new and thermo (195*) so

i just bought the car monday. its a 305 TBI 92..so i just re-placed the water pump and thermo to a 180* tonight, added pre-mixed 50/50 plus 1 bottle of water wetter. i started car and let it idle for 10 min.. then took it out around the block.. the temp guage got up to almost redline within 10min.!!! i know the fan was on, then i sat at a stop sign and idled.. temp went to 220 and sat there.. i started driving again.. temp went up to 240.. idled again.. went back to 210... what the hell is goin on??? this is crap..

my only thought is that the Catalytic converter is bad and causing heat... anyone want to jump in here on this one??? please help.. im all out of idea's.

David Fisher
Orange CA

 

try blocking the thermostat open with an asprin to make sure there is no air trapped in the system and look under the car and make sure that there is an airdam in place if not you may have gotten the car hot enough on the drive home at 80 to crack a head or blow a head gasket but that is the worst case scenario and I would exhaust all possibilities before ripping the motor apart besides these cars tend to like to run at around 200-220 in stock form anyway I don`t think the stock fan switch even turns the fan on until 230 or 240 so there may not be anythinfg wrong at all also try turning the ac on as it turns the fan on as well.

 

usually the cause of overheating on the highway is from a bad or missing airdam and or a collasping lower radiator hose..

 

the hoses are all new... the air damn is in place... i have a K&N with the Extreme lid...

there is no leak in the heads... i did exhaust test for a leaky head.. nothing there...

 

just because the airdam is there does not mean that it is good mine was there when I bought my TA but woould fold back at speed causing it to get warm at about 80 so I safety wired it to the front bumper and that solved my problem.

 

Have you checked your timing lately?

 

no i havent.. thats the one thing i need to do.. i don't have a timing light, so on monday or tuesday im going to take it to a place that can check it.

just so i know... what should the correct timing be for my car??


92 RS L03 5 speed.

thanks guys..

 

Factory timing was set at 0'btc, it should say it on the emissions sticker. But if you have done a few little mods, start it at 4'. You could also set the timing with a vacuum gauge. Don't forget to pull the tan w/ black stripe wire connector apart. Read the tech article if you have questions.

 

set the timing just to be sure and replace the thermostat also.

 

I would say definetly make sure all the air is out of the system. Run the engine for a while with the cap off and keep adding water/coolant mix until the level stops dropping before replacing the cap. Other than that just do what everyone else is suggesting.

 

i agree.. it has to be the airdamn. when i got my iroc and it had the guts 305, it would overheat on cold/cool nights.. come to find out i had no air damn. ever sicn ethen.. i have had no real cooling problems... and now that i put the 406 in.. i have a hige radiator and water pump and the car never gets above 140*'s except when i do dyno pulls (usually 3 concecutave) and then it will get to 150-155*

 

boys.... its been solved...

the thermostats (2 both brand new) were faulty..

i had 2 180* thermos and BOTH were sheeeeit. i took the last one out.. and i couldnt even push the spring down manually.. both were stuck.. i grabbed my 160* from my old Iroc that was totalled a while back... cleaned it up... checked it out before i installed it.. and problem is solved!!!

the odd thing though.. is that while driving, it still is at 215* with a 160* thermo? that sound right ?? i didnt think so.. i shouldnt think it would get above 200*..

on a side note.. i also installed a JET chip stage 2. noticed a difference in low end.

oh and my air damn is fine.. nothing wrong in that dept. thanks guys

dave