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Thread: heating problem?? pls help

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jun 2009
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    heating problem?? pls help

    i have a 403 olds in a 1978 buick electra(w/49' merc body channeled over frame, floor boards, and drive train).....and i need some help.

    the car has sat for 10 years without no more then 100 miles per year driven on it. now ive been driving it a lot more over the last week.

    here are my problems....

    car is over heating, all thursday-saturday was running 180-205 degrees, on sunday it got up to 215-220 degrees.....that was only for about 5-10 minutes!! was not running a radiator cap "tightened", was not a pressurized system because of small pin hole in tank. even without being pressurized....still got that hot and boiled the water/coolant. water was coming out of cap and over flow(which runs to under the car to drain)

    i had decided to take the radiator out and have it clean and redone(cored/pressure tested). radiator is out of something else(old impala i think). it is one of the brass kind. car has special brackets for radiator so i dont want to swich radiators if i dont have to.

    when i pushed on the radiator hose it sounded like it was cracking inside, assumed it was just dry rotted, but when i pulled the hose off the top of the radiator, there where little peices of rust. 1/4" flakes mostly. some tiny boulders that where 1/8"!!!! maybe a todlers palm of hands worth, if that.

    now for the problems i found....

    1. When i look inside the radiator hose, the wires have rusted!!!

    2. when i took off the the thermastate housing...it was a little surface rust but no bolders.

    3. the thermastate itself is one peice, but of course its stuck open or close(not sure how to tell).

    4. oil looks fine. no metel or water.


    i will be ordering all the parts tues/wed this week. the list of the parts to be replaced is....1. radiator(redone at radiator shop or replacing. depending on what radiator shop has to say). 2. thermastate housing. 3. thermastate. 4. water pump. 5. all hoses(needless to say) 6. radiator cap. 7. anything else that helps it run cool. EVERYTHING WILL BE NEW when it comes to cool except freeze plugs!

    now for my questions......

    1. is there anything else i should be doing to make sure my motor is ok? that i havent damaged it? that it will run fine/cool in the future?

    2.do you think i have caused damage to the motor? is there a way to check for any?

    3. any tricks i should do while im redoing all the cooling items on my motor? anything?!?

    you should know that after i bolt all this together, i will be changing the oil/filter. i have turned the motor over to make sure it didnt sound funny. also, please remeber "the radiator is out of something else(old impala i think). it is one of the brass kind. car has special brackets for radiator so i dont want to swich radiators if i dont have to." i know the aluminum ones run cooler, but really dont want to rebuild front end and i like the brass ones.

    when it ran hot(210-220 on sunday), the few minutes i ran the car like that, it never made any noices, or quit pulling. after i stopped i put a BIG garage fan on the motor to cool it down.

    so...in short...did i hurt it? how do i check? if so, how do i fix it?

    thanks so much in advance!!

    Chris

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
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    A couple of things: it sounds as if a lot of crud broke free and was floating around in your cooling system, probably blocking the flow in several places which would help cause the higher temps. Also, bear in mind that running a modern system without the proper pressure (no cap, cap loose, pinholes in the system, etc.) will cause the coolant to boil out at (relatively) low temps. The boiling point of a system rises 3 degrees for every pound of pressure: a 7 pound cap will raise the boiling point to 233 deg, for instance. I think that, had your system been airtight, even with the blockage, your engine would not have boiled over. It's the combination that did you in. It sounds like you've covered all of the bases, though. Good luck!

  3. #3
    You dont need to worry about the engine. Engines can run way hotter than 215-230 degrees. I would also recommend running some type of corrosion/radiator flush through the system.

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