Re: Drilling thermostat
 

Yes, go drink more jello shots.

On topic, honestly, start with a coolant system pressure check. It could be as little as a bad clamp on a TB heater hose. If you smell coolant, it's leaking from somewhere. Pressurize to 15 psi, and check for the leak. Does the waterpump have any shaft-play when you spin it with your hand? slide in and out at all?

-A. Swift

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

New coolant in the car. Approximately a 85/15 water/coolant mixture, with a whole bottle of Water Wetter.


If i'm not mistaken, to much coolant isn't always better. Thats why it comes in premixed jugs as 50/50 not 70/30 or 85/15 drain some coolant let the neighbors cats drink it and add some water.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

Water actually cools much better than anti-freeze. Anti-freeze is basically to keep the coolant in your block from feezing durring the winter anc cracking your block and sheit. Pressure test the system, and go from there. and yes, jello shots FTMFT :)

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

People need to post true. Anti-freeze lubes the water pump stops rust and corrosion in the cooling system rises to boiling point and no freezing in the winter. To much anti freeze in the system is bad lowers the boiling point and will gel in the winter. So unless you know what your talking about dont post.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

if you take tstat out the water will move too fast and won't have time to absorb the heat... or cool off..

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

^^It wont move too fast.. it just will be allowed to flow through the radiator all the time versus opening and letting some through to cool.. controlled by the tstats temp rating.

I ran straight distilled water with water wetter the last summer I had my gsx, along a 180 thermostat. It did run about 10 degrees cooler, but my fans were also too small. I tried taking the tstat out alltogether but that just delays temps getting up to normal.. they eventually get up there anyway. It just takes the car longer to warm up.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

What I said was true, I just didn't bother to list off everything you did. And the truth is, water DOES act as a better coolant than antifreeze, but has a lower boiling point than antifreeze (which is one of many reasons you run a mix). This agrument is pointless anyways. Let us know how everything turns out when you get your fan fixed B

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

Run some clothes dryer ducting from the front around the I/C. build a fan shroud or semi-fan shroud to protect from the exhaust bits.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

I say get rid of your ac condesor! J/K I know you want to keep your AC.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

HAHA wow that was fun to read! I'll go back and address everyone's comments.

Swifty - ok so you retorque them without loosening them, thanks! Is that what everyone else does as well? Just want to be sure. And about pressure testing the system, that is a good idea, and I have been wanting to do that, and searching all the auto parts stores to see if anyone has one for rent, but nobody does. And they are over $100 to just buy, and I don't want to do that. Do you or does anyone know where I could find one to use? Also you said something about figuring out where all the coolant is going, but like I said, it doesn't seem like coolant is going anywhere. After that trip I waited for the car to cool down, and I popped the rad cap. It looked a little low, but all I added was like a splash, hardly anything, maybe like 3 tablespoons. That splash was probably just in the overflow bottle because the overflow looked just a little bit more full then it did in the beginning. So I don't think I'm losing coolant really, or just so small of an amount that it's not even noticable really. About the water pump, I'm pretty sure they put a new one in when they put the motor together. I haven't checked for shaft play on it, i suppose I could just take that front pipe off and just reach in there to see how it all feels.

2003eclipse - I think you are reading what I said backwards. I have 85 WATER and 15 ANIT-FREEZE. Water cools better, but I wanted some antifreeze in there because it does raises the boiling point, and it also lubricates and protects everything a little bit too. So I didn't want to go straight water, I wanted a little antifreeze in there still.

LB - Fan was fixed before the trip to Minnetonka/Plymouth/Blaine. Still running hot.

CHromepuff - I have been looking into ways to get more airflow to the radiator. Possibly knockin some holes in the bumper. Just seeing what all I can do. I don't have a good way to route any kind of like dryer ducting though, there's not much room really. One thing I'm also looking at is putting some kinda vent in the hood, like what evo's have, to allow that hot air in between the manifold and radiator to escape

x-pride - that is something I did fail to mention. The car still has A/C, so I have a nice huge condesor in front of my radiator still. It's not really clogged or anything. But I really want to keep A/C in this car as it is still functional, and comes in handy on those really hot days! But as a last resort, I will have to consider removing it.

Also I will add that when I added the new coolant, I let the car idle for around 15 minutes with the cap off, and the car parked on an incline, to "burp" any bubbles out that there might be.

So... anyone know where I can get a coolant system pressure tester thingamajig?

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

I believe it also prevents rusting in the coolent runners.

Also make sure that both fans are running. I had this kind of problem when i was running only one fan. Managed to fit the other fan and it cooled right down.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

Just use a boost leak tester and attach it to your radiator hose, but be sure not to plug the other end of the hose.
LOL jk

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Both fans were not running, hence the reason I put a new one in yesterday. Did not affect things much.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

just stop up today and we will get it fixed

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

I'm pretty sure you can rent them from checker too

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

Did you adjust your coolant temp off-set in dsmlink? My car worked very well with the fluidyne radiator, 160 deg thermostat and water wetter. I ran 70%water, 30% anti-freeze. I adjusted my temp off-set to 20 deg so the fans would come on 20 deg sooner. Worked great. Just remember that a cooling system has a "window" of operation. The thermostat determines the low end, the fans and cooling efficiency of the system determines the high end.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

You could try building a sheet metal air scoop under the radiator to direct cooler air twards the radiator. This way the radiator won't only be getting air thats been pre warmed by the IC and AC core

I dont think the 1g dsm link version has the coolant off-set. The fans on a 1g arnt controled by the ECU.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

^^ Ahh Very nice idea! I think I will try that with the scraps I got laying around. Any clearance issues carltalon?

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

None of the Auto stores around here that I called, had a tester (napa, checker, auto zone). Mark had one so I went up there and we tested it. On the drive up there, the car was just fine. Probably because it's a cooler day today then it was yesterday. Anywho, we did the test and found one tiny little leak where the clamp wasn't holding real tight. So we replaced the small rubber line and used the screw type clamps so it'll hold and seal. Topped off the coolant, burped the system, and so far so good. But again, it was working good on the way there also because of the cooler day today. But we beat on the car a bit on the way home to see if we could get it to overheat, but it didn't. So we'll see how it works on a hotter day.

Also, I will be getting a vent for my hood to help some of that hot air escape out of there. I figure it can only help.

Re: Drilling thermostat
 

Well I took it on a little road trip to test it again since Mark's shop really wasn't that far away. After about 15 minutes, the temps climbed and the CEL came on. So I turned on the heater, CEL went away, and we drove probably another 45 minutes with the heater on and it worked fine. If we turned the heater off, the temps would climb again. I am going to be installing a vent in the hood, just over the exhaust manifold. Hopefully that will help to expel a lot of the heat in that area, and help out my situation a little. It'll look similar to this, but I'm only doing the big one in the center, not 2 of them like they did here http://carbontrix.com/images/inhood.JPG