I have had poblems cooling my car in town for a while now. It runs hot when I drive it at speeds below 50. Yesterday it was 85 degrees outside I rode through town for about ten minutes and it was running 225. This is with the a/c on. I was driving at speeds below 40

My car has is a H/C car with a D1 procharger. I have the twin intercoolers. I did keep my bottom air dam.

I have the extra spal 9 inch fan...........I know that both fans are blowing in the correct direction. I also have a ron davis radiator and a evans water pump with a 160 t stat. I have a new radiator cap and I am running distilled water in the system.

I have run the car several times jacked up with the radiator cap off to get air out of the system.


When I get out on the highway it does cool off, but only to 195 or so. I still think that is too warm for what I have done to the cooling system.

I am reading the temps with hp tuners and I have programmed the fans to come on at 180

I kept the factory setting to have the fans cut off at speeds above 35.


I put foam around the procharger shroud to keep it sealed to the radiator.


I noticed a bad odor last time I pulled the cap off the radiator. It smelled like something rotton. The water inside the radiator is cloudy, and has a little bit of black stuff in it.




I am out of option on what to replace and check. Maybe someone can give some suggestions.


Thanks,


Brent

 

Geeeeez. No way you should be having that cooling issue under normal driving conditions. Sounds like air to me. I know you took measures to remove it, but,.......
Do you have the front steam vents in the heads connected together & then to the top of the radiator top hose on the radiator?

 

I need to look when i get home to make sure that I didn't swap those one of the times that the radiator has been out. That hose from the cross over tube should go on the top right under the rad cap?

 

I have the hose to the overflow res. on the top outlet directly under the cap and I have the hose coming from the crossover tube connected to the outlet under that(bottom outlet)

that looks correct?

 

I want to make sure we are talking about the same thing. The overflow small tube is fine. There are very small openings on the top of each head, one drivers side toward fans & one passengers side. You need to connect these two openings in the heads w/ a crossover tube (stock) or small fuel or water line 1/4" or 5/16", then you need to "T" into that crossover line into either the top of the radiator or into the top radiator hose. If you haven't done this, you will have issues.

If what you described is this, then you are OK. Just run the car w/ the heater on in order to circulate air out of the system. I would also crack one of the openings on the heads to see if air or water comes out.

 

yeah I've got that line running to the radiator I will loosen it to make sure there is no air.




One thing that I noticed when I was logging some driving last night..............I drove in town for no more than 15 minutes...............then car got up to 225 in town. that was at speeds below 40. I got onto another road and drove at 60 for about 4 miles. The temp went down fron 225 to 197. My a/c was on both times the only thing that changed was the speed I was driving. It was about 83 degrees out side


Last night I drove on the highway(70mph) for about 30 minutes and the temp stayed around 176-180. It was about 76 degrees outside. I pulled off the highway to turn around and the car got up to 192 and cooled back to 178 within a couple of miles back on the highway.



This has got to be an air flow prob


At one3 time I cut a peice of plastic to install the slp cold air kit. This was the peice that forms the tunnel that the fresh air would come in. I also noticed some places that could use some foam and sealing since everyhing is no longer factory.
My a/c condensor is filled with little rocks. I have tried to wash that out. I am thinking that all of this may be to blame for my problems


I always thought that that would not affect cooling at slow speeds because I have the fans, but now I am thinking that the fans are pulling hot engine air and not cooler air from the front of the car

 

I've got pretty much the same issue... however I'm having to go by the stock guage, but it sounds about the same...

I've got H/C, bolt-ons... Be Cool dual core radiator, 160 t-stat, water wetter, tuned fans... and when driving my temps seem to be fine, however, if i'm sitting still for about 10 minutes with the A/C on full blast not moving, the temp looks to rise up to about 225-230... at that point I got in the car and started driving it again afraid of them going any higher. Then the temps went back down to normal...

I'm not sure if this is a normal thing or not... I mean, I am in Phoenix where it's easily in the 110-120 degree range often in the summer...

I'd just like to think with my mods, I'd be running normal temps at least all the time...

I mean, the be cool radiator claims a 20 degree drop, the water wetter claims about the same... not to mention a 160 t-stat and tuned fans...

i'm confused...

 

Yeah that is about the same thing as I have. I am getting a new plastic peice that I cut for the slp scoop and I am also going to get a new ac condensor(or atleast take it off and pressure wash the rocks out of it). the condensor is packed with little rocks. I am going to get weather stripping and try to seal off the tunnel that would bring fresh air. It makes sense that the fans are pulling air from the engine bay instead of air from outside the car, even if the car is sitting still.

 

Well, here's the deal. As you probably know. At slow speeds, 45 and less, the fans do pretty much ALL of the cooling work to cool the coolant that is sitting in the radiator waiting to get cooled. As you get to speeds above 45-50 on the highway, the air dam takes over the work and the fans really don't need to come on.

So, I would say...make sure that your fans are BOTH working. BUT...its important to make sure they are working on BOTH the "low' and "high" settings.

Also, you need to make sure that your condensor is clean. After about 4 years, all of our F-Body's need that maintenance. If you don't clean the condensor you will, over time, run hotter and hotter while driving slow in the city. ESPECIALLY with the A/C "on".


BINGO.....your condensor is not allowing ambient temp air to flow easily through your condensor and into the radiator. The condensor is getting hotter than it is supposed to get and its partially blocked, coupled with the hotter air that is getting through and going directly into the radiator.

It starts a downward spiral process. The coolant in the radiator is waiting to be cooled while the t-stat is closed. But the t-stat can only stay closed so long until the coolant in the heads/block gets too hot and opens the t-stat to swap the hot coolant with the cooler coolant that was supposedly cooled down sitting in the radiator. The time the t-stat stays closed gets shorter and shorter until it basically won't close and the coolant now flows freely just getting hotter and hotter.


Try this: Go for a drive and keep the A/C off. Just do stop and go driving and keep it under 40mph. Do it for 20 minutes after the engine is at operating temp. See if the temps stay low. If they do, you have to clean your condensor.

I do mine every 2 years. Because after about 4-5 years I had the identical problem with a perfectly running cooling system. Cleaning the condensor is all I did and it runs cool as it can possibly run.

Also, don't just use 100% distilled water. Put a half a jug of Dextcool in there with 1 bottle of water wetter.

 

I just recently (after 9 years) cleaned my condenser too due to the same situation. I removed the fans and radiator and 'banged' the condenser (still hooked up to the AC) up against the frame rail. I also hit the top of it (not direct into it) with a 2x4 and it dislodged a ton of crap. Finally sprayed simple green in from the front, went over it with a brush and blew compressed air from the engine side outwards. No more problems.

 

I went to the shop and had the freon pulled out of the system and I am going to take the condersor off and wash it really well.

I have ran with the a/c off a few times and it does keep the temps down a good bit. Prob a good 10-15 degrees. That coupled with the fact that my top air dam was blocking almost half of the flow to the radiator.

 

Are you running just distilled water? No coolant, water wetter, just water? Remember coolant/anti-freeze raises the the boiling temperature of water. Its not just so the water doesn't freeze.

 

I was waiting about putting any of that in the system until I got finished taking everything apart. I didn't see that water wetter would help much.

I had always thought that pure water would cool better. that's why all the race cars use plain water. I may be wrong though

 

Cars that are stictly for drag racing use just water in case they do leak at the drag strip, straight water will not cause track issues. If you lay down antifreeze/water mix it is a harder track cleanup.

 

When you get it all cleaned up and back together, use 1 bottle of water wetter and half a jub of Dexcool.....it will run cooler than water, possibly up to 25 degrees across the board.

And when you clean the condensor don't even so much as touch the front or back with anything, not even your fingers. You will bend the cooling fins very easily.

 

here are some pics of the condensor and the air dam that I cut for the slp ram air


The pics of the condensor are after I used coil cleaner and even brake cleaner. Then washing it out with a water hose and then an air hose.

I think I am deff going to get a new condensor..............I checked at the parts store and I can get one for a little under 100 bucks.

I will tell you if all this helps when I get it back together with the new condensor. I would think the condensor and the air dam was hurting me a lot.

 

I am going to put the new condensor in tonight, but i have been running with the new air dam. That has made a lot of difference so far.

 

I stand corrected The air dam and the condensor did help, but after getting the freon put back into the system the car will still run too warm in town.

I drove through town with the ac on and it got up to 225 driving at speeds at or below 45. I got back on the highway and turned the ac off and it cooled to 180. I turned the ac on on the highway and it warmeb up a bit to 183. As soon as I slowed down it got up to 190 in a matter of a couple of minutes. It was about 82 degrees today.

I don't see any way that this is air in the system or even a head gasket or a blocked passage in the heads. I say this because of the fact that it cools very well on the highway.


I guess this still leads to air flow. The air has a clear path to the condensor now, the condensor is new and I have the additional 9" spal fan. I guess that I will re-check the direction of the fans, but I am almost positive that they are hooked up correctly.

I will drive around with and without the ac on to see just how much of a difference that is making. Any chance this could be because of a bad ac compressor?



Any suggestions??? I have tried everything

 

LOL if I don't get this fixed I'm taking ac powersteering and power brakes off and making this bitch really really fast

 

There's nothing wrong with running at 225 in town with the A/C "on". If the fans are wroking properly (both high and low settings) and pulling air through (towards the engine) the condensor and radiator....and the airflow is like stock airflow to the condensor...........you have another problem.