Club 80-90 Forums

nice block work Martin

Obviously doesnt park the van on there
mm

Hi all

Quick up-date, I had a bit of trouble with the tempreture guage which just needed the earth crowns cleaning . So with a functioning (I can only hope) tempreture guage I was a bit more happy to run the engine.

I did get some oil but I didnt change it in the end as me youngest had his b/d party so had to lend a hand there. I ran the van for a good half hour and to be fair it is getting better a little bit, but the longer the van run it started to backfire quite badly, it was definatly coming from the right hand side of the engine this time.

After the half hour the tempreture guage was in the red and the led was flashing , the fan hadnt cut in and Ive got a good idea that the thermostat has packed up and the coolant system needs bleeding ( I un-screwed the valve on the top of the rad and no water came out). The bleeding was something I'd planned on getting the garage thats doing the MOT to do as Ive tried to do it on the drive and got no where.

Not sure where to go with it at the moment , Its running enough to drive it on the back of a low-loader to get it to the garage for the MOT but Im reluctant to pay the garage to do simple jobs. As me budget is a bit tight this month.

James

Been out having a play about, Fan is working but theres obviously a air lock/faulty thermostat which is preventing it coming on as the coolants not moving.

Is there a way of checking if the coolant tempreture sensor is faulty? as the tempreture guage is still playing random silly buggers.

cheers

James

disconnect the temp sender an connect the wires together
this should send the needle to the max, if it does the sender is working.


the fan is independent of any gauge an sender on the engine.
if you have a two speed fan the first speed should come on before the gauge reaches the max
test the fan sender for any faults...haynes

if bled properly and the thermostat is good the gauge should barely venture over 1/2 way, as the rad is very efficient in this weather especially.
revving the engine will produce more heat and should trigger the fan.
87 deg is when the thermostat opens and fully open at 105 deg
93-8 deg the first speed fan engages
95-100 deg is when the second speed engages
all these systems ensure your temp remains fairly constant...unless some thing is faulty

Cheers Kev

The fan is now a single speed one . If thats by design or by bodge Im not sure , but theres only 2 wires connected to the tempreture sensor on the rad.

To be fair to the van after 4 years layed up expecting it to run well was a bit much. I have a feeling I may have created a airlock in the system myself when it came to fitting the front to back coolant pipes by restricting the space the heating pipes have in the hole in the cross member . Got a horrible feeling there pinched to the point that water isnt going to flow through them .

Would that affect the cooling system, I'll see if I can get a picture tomorrow.

cheers

james

by design for the fan... 93-8 deg single speed
a pinched heater matrix feed would not bother the main curcuit