I had a near-overheating experience on the way back to SD from LA in 5 1/2 hrs of bumper-to-bumper Memorial Day weekend traffic.

I still had the BPV routed back into the blower inlet, and the single 16" ATI fan wasn't cutting it in the higher temps and stopped traffic. (Like "check gauges", "oh ****" hot; needle almost went into the red before I pulled over and shut the car off and opened the hood, using the fan to cool and cranking it over every few min to circulate). I had been running the A/C before I saw it starting to get hot, then switched over to the heater which I thought would help but didn't - never saw steam or anything bad... It made it home fine staying at 210 on the dummy console gauge after I turned off the heater, but when I checked the coolant level Sun AM it was about 2-3 cups low under the rad cap - but the resivoir was still holding coolant ? I topped it off in the rad, and checked the oil but couldn't get a good reading on the oil dipstick, streaks of dirty oil in clear, looked like coolant in the oil.

So, I drained the oil into a pan - the good news is I didn't see any coolant/water in the oil. So, I changed the oil and filter and fired it up and brought it up to temp, and checked the oil again. The oil looked fine, and I let it cool overnight. Checked the coolant the next AM and it was full under the cap. So... I drove it to work today and I am going to keep a close eye on the coolant level and the oil until I'm sure it's either OK or fooked...

As a side note, I recently put a check valve in the PCV line and I haven't been catching much "funk" in the catch can due to the reduced flow. Might have been a result of that but I'd think it would burn off at that high temp ?

Anytyhing I should check for specifically or just wait and see ? Hope I didn't #*(% something up. I could do a coolant system pressure test I guess...

Thanks for any tips.

Cheers,
Rob (Bad30th)