I posted about a car I sold to a kid a little while back, it's been a few weeks and he fixed the problem with the wiring in the steering wheel, but apparently it's overheating badly now. This kid has absolutely NO experience with cars mechanically and I had big reservations about selling the car and told him that he was probably taking on more than he should, but he assured me this was the car he wanted. Now he calls me today and says he was pulling up in front of his house and the temp shot up to the red, the car died, and then smoke came out from the hood (this is killing me because I loved that car) So I asked him if there was a puddle under the car which he said he didn't know, but that a neighbor who is a mechanic said there is a major leak somewhere. Now I JUST replaced the water pump for him for free before I gave him the car and that was working fine and the car wasn't overheating then. I'm wondering if maybe anyone has any ideas if it could be the theromstat or the radiator or maybe even a hose somewhere. The kid actually had the gonads to ask me to buy it back and I told him that I gave him a heads up that it needed work and even fixed three major problems on it before giving it to him without raising the price on the thing and that it was really his problem, but I'd see if I could find out advice and pass along the numbers of anyone else who calls for the car. I think I'm being pretty generous here. Any advice or ideas?

 

Alright, if he is overheating there are few resons that will make the hood smoke.

First of all is there air dam under the car. If not than this should be fixed first.
Second of all is the radiator cap new or old? If it cant hold preassure it will overheat.
I doubt a thermostat sticking, but it could be.
If he messed with the wiring there is a possibility that he f-ed up the wiring for the fan. This will overheat it too. Just wire in a switch.
If there is no overflow tank and the port is capped on the radiator than it can build enough preassure where the cap would blow off.
IS the water pump the right pump. Cuz some of our cars require you install reverse flow pump!
How old is the radiator???
A bottom hose could be collapsing.
A leak will defenetly cause something like this, but depending on the size of it, it could take longer for it to overheat.
So, I suggest either you or him look at all the stuff I wrote down, use common sense, and get back to me.

Laters.

 

A head gasket will make the car overheat too, it's what happened on my LT1.

 

That would probably be the last thing I would check. Not very common. Dont wanna spook anyone if its just something simple.

 

Could also be intake gasket(very common after 100k miles).