Im not sure if my temp gauge is reading accurate or not.When I got the car the temp wire was unplugged and rolled up with another wire so it wasent reading anything.The car runs great and has lots of power (maybe a slight tune-up would be good).Anyhow i noticed the car liked to sit at about 220-230 in hot traffic and wouldent move much when it got on the freeway.The temp gauge does show colder temps when i gun it for a second and then let off to stop at a light.But dosent move on the highway much (air dam is intact).I pulled the t-stat out and replaced the 195 with a 160.Upon doing this i broke the vaccum line fiiting that connects to the t-stat houseing its blue in color and dosent appear to leak so i left it. (they are two sensor like things which i have no clue what they are),could this cause heating problems?.Now with the 160 t-stat in the car got much hotter then usual on the highway when i exited off it was right near the red zone so I pulled over and looked under the engine bay the coolent wasent bubbling it looked normal and was at a good level.Does it sound like my gauge or sender could be bad? what exacley is the thing i broke on the T-stat houseing?


thanks

 

The thing that broke is a TVS (thermal vacuum switch) There are 2 on the thermo housing. One is for the dist. vac advance and the other is for the EFE. Don't worry about the EFE, junk anyway. Follow the vac lines and see where it goes. If it's your dist. vac advance then you need that one. If it's the EFE then plug the line comming from the carb.


There may be an air bubble trapped to cause the temp to rise like that after replacing the thermo. Run the car for a while with the rad cap off to help burp it. Keep an eye on the temp at the same time. Could also be a faulty brand new thermo. I've seen that happen too.