Running slightly warm??

[athflying79]

Over the past 2 months I've had cooling problems. The first was a stuck thermostat when I first bought the car. Replaced it and everything was fine for about a month. Then decided to replace my cooling hoses since I had a slight leak and they were all well past due for replacement. Replaced everything including the heater core hoses. Everything was ok, but had a couple near overheats because of bleeding problems. I then replaced the water pump because it was getting noisy. Found a heater core hose was leaking because of a loose clamp. Got all of that taken care of and no more overheating, but now the needle sits about a needles width to the right on my temp gauge. I have noticed on the freeway it goes to dead center but in traffic it climbs just to the right.

The PO has replaced the fan clutch, radiator, and reservoir. I've heard if a thermostat is to hot for to long, it is possible to damage it. I'm wondering if I should go ahead and put another new one in there. What else should I be thinking of???

[Panda]

Had a similar problem with mine overheating. Problem was the radiator had silted up and needed flushing.

[632 Regal]

I dont think you have anything to panick about but would replace the stat soon. Get the BMW one, it has a checkball thingie to help bleeding instead of drilling a hole.

[liquidtiger720]

Mine does that too actually...I've been fine for a year.

[blackpawn5]

you have absolutley nothing to worry about , as long as it isnt increasing you are fine, when BMWs would roll off the showroom floor they did that. the germans didnt get everything perfect.

[Jon K]

Mine does it too... about 1/16 or 1/32" to the straight up mark... I think it's just the way the gauge shows. I can tell you what my coolant temp is, hang on.


http://e34.digital7.com/MegaSquirt/datalogtemps.jpg

In this datalog, it shows my car running after 20 minutes. The car had been idling for about 5 minutes previous to this datalog, the needle on the stock cluster was straight up + one needle tips width to the right, slightly over "middle".


This datalog is stopped at a point I find interesting. The engine is at almost 6000rpm, part throttle about 50%, making about 5.2 PSI of boost with a coolant temp of 186 while moving. The coolant, green line, goes up to 191 degrees after it sits idlign for a minute once stopped moving. This is not driving hard or anything, but was logged while getting gas about 5 miles away. Even when the engine is being pushed hard... upwards of 9 psi of boost, the engine rarely goes over 200 degrees coolant temp. Just posted this to show a little bit of "real world" data. Again, my coolant needle on the dash sits just to the right of the middle mark, but as you can see my temps are fine.

[mamilapon]

Mine does exactly the same but does not move any further to the right.No worries mate!