I had a belt break tonight and overheated the car, for only a couple miles. Had the coolant blow all over the place from the overflow can and such.

It was only for a couple miles before i noticed, and it wasnt running like that long, do you think i could have damaged anything? what should i check? I was going to drain the oil, pull the plugs and see of the motor holds water. Anything else? Im freaking out right now and i cant think straight, im terrified that i may have F-ed up my motor!

Help!!!!!

 

first thing to check is the oil, see if any coolant mixed with it. From there I'd do a cooling system pressure check. Next would be a compression check. Where do you live in central jersey? I'm in hamilton.

 

flemington/ringoes

 

ah cool your a little south of me. hope everything is ok!

 

Dude, I'm not a master mechanic, but it sounds like your water pump stopped pumping because the belt was gone, and your coolant was not running through the system, and your car simply overheated because of this.

I would replace the belt and run your car.

 

I Agree then post and tell us how it's running if you haven't done so already.

 

Do an oil change just to be safe and look for coolant in your oil, if it looks ok then put a new belt on and run the car.Hopefully you didn't blow a head gasket.

 

LOL, trust me, your fine. You can check to see if the oil was cooked, but so long as the engine block itself still had plenty of coolant in it (whether circulated, or not), I'm quite sure nothing happened. You'll KNOW when an engine overheats badly, the pistons eventually seize against the cylinder walls and will stall. Again, if the car was in motion, kicking up air to cool, and the block had sufficient coolant, I seriously doubt you were above 250 degrees. While your at it though, get a serpentine setup will ya....

 

I really hope you intended that to be drenched in sarcasm.



Saturday i pulled plugs, checked the oil, and everything looked fine, topped off the coolant and it started up no problems, no smoke/steam ect. Ran for a while and had to foam in the oil so i think im good.
thanks guys
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i turned it off and you could hear it boiling, so i think it was really up there

serpentine? why? its just more clutter

 

Normally 50/50 mixtures (depending on concentration, of course) of water and ethylene glycol antifreeze in the cooling system will boil at 225 degrees when exposed, but as long as the system is sealed and holding pressure, boiling temperature is raised up to 265 degrees, depending on the cap's rated psi. It's hard to say in your case, as you were moving, coolant was spewing, and it all happened within a matter of minutes. Did the engine stall? Was the engine straining to turn over (if it stalled) when trying to re-start (piston seizure)? Did you check for any burnt crud in the oil....?

 

it must have been boiling out of the overflow and thats why i heard it.

heres what happened, the car made a clunk noise before i got onto the flemington circle, right in front of wendys, that was the belt coming off, i didnt realize it at the time, and a couple seconds later i noticed it had stalled, at that point i was right on the circle. It wouldnt start right up, but it did not strain to crank, just would not fire. this does happen sometimes when its hot, i think it have a small vapor lock issue. It started up about 30 seconds later, and at that time is was not overheated, then a couple miles down the road is when I found it overheating and shut it down.


I didnt drain the oil, but its fine on the dipstick, should i drain it?

and like i said it was running saturday afternoon with no problems

 

^ For peace of mind I would drain it, this would eliminate any possible burnt/sludge buildup, eventually causing inadequate oil to the cam bearings. From your description though, it honestly sounds like your fine. When the heck are you planning to join us over at e-town one Friday night with that thing.....?

 

when i stop breaking the damn thing , and get the rear tire clearance figured out. Do you frequent e-town most fridays? since the weather is getting better and the car is starting to be in working order, i may go sometime soon