I have a 1992 Camaro RS 3.1L V6 A/T with 230,xxx on the clock. As far as i know it still has the 195 degree stat in it. I'm going to start driving the car again since the price of gas is up. I parked the car a couple of years ago because it would get hot in traffic. When it would get hot you could give it gas and it would just sputter and miss till it died. I never solved this problem. I even grounded the fan circiut and manually ran the fans. The black air dam under the car is still there and intact. I have owned the car since it had 170,xxx on it and never replaced anything cooling related in that time period. How is the single electric fan turned on in this car? If you have any ideas or suggestions i would be glad to hear them. Thanks in advance.

 

Someone has to have some idea of what i have going on with the car.....

 

Fan Temp switch? I know that was the issue on my 5.0....... maybe it has the same setup?

 

Well, you didn't actually say it overheated, just that it got up to temp (hot) and would start dying on you. i dont think that your cooling system is to blame here, unless you're talking about it dying at 260 degrees.

My car's overheated before and it drove fine even at 260 degrees. Didn't even bat an eye. Horrible experience, but still, if you're sputtering and dying, i find it very hard to believe that your coolant system is to blame. It sounds much more likely that the problem may be triggered by heat. Possibly bad sensors such that once you go into closed loop (warmed up) you ECM gets nonsense to work with.

 

Could very well be the ignition control module.
Once they get hot they will make the engine run really bad or kill it all together.
Some parts stores can test them but they usually test good cause they are cold. This also explains why it will start and run just fine until it's warm/hot.
Usually pretty cheap too.

Along with what safemode said, how hot does your car get.

Also if you have never touched your cooling system you may want to have it flushed.

 

I don't think it has ever actually overheat to the point where it has sprayed coolant or steam out of the car. I know once at a car show in Gatlinburg, TN the underhood/oil temps were hot enough to melt/bubble up the paint off of my oil filter.

I could agree with you all on something getting hot and shorting out with all the heat in the engine bay. Kcb37, i have had to put three ignition control modules on the car and when they have went before they give no warning to me.

When the car usually sputters, spits, and eventually dies it is running in excess of 250 and sitting in heavy traffic for a little while. I have the fan relay grounded on a toggle switch so i can turn it on whenever i like, but it still got hot and sputtered till it died. Then you have to let it sit and cool off for a while and it will start back up. Sometimes after it starts back up it will have a miss in it while driving till it cools completely off.

I probably just neeed a way to reduce my underhood temps or trac down my parts that is possibly shorting under heat soak.

Does my 1992 have a fan switch or is the fan ECM controlled? It has the single fan setup in it.

 

it has a fan switch on the passenger side of the engine block (from the bottom). it also comes on with the AC, the fan should turn off even if the temp is up once the car is going at least 40mph also i think, since the airflow is sufficient to over-work the fan (assuming your air dam is working).

When i had a problem with my coolant system not being able to cool even with the fan on, i found the solution to be replacing the thermostat. It was clogged up with dexcool and rust. The thermostat has moving parts, and can easily rust up and no longer function correctly. It's a 10 min fix and costs 7 bucks. Get the 180 unless you're really worried about emissions tests.

The other idea is that some other part of the coolant system is restricted (radiator for instance). This can be tested during a good flushing.

 

Rhis weekend i'm going to work on it. I'm going to pull the radiator and make sure i don't have crap between it and the condenser, then i'm going to give it a good flush and some new coolant. I will probably go ahead and change the thermostat out too since its such an inexpensice part.

Do any of you reccomend drilling bypass holes in the new thermostat? If so where should i drill and what number and size of holes do i need?