Thermostat nightmare

[tamson]

On holiday in the van in Yorkshire. First stop was the Vdub show in Leeds and after an eighty mile drive from Newcastle and an hour sitting in stop start traffic entering the site, the engine was starting to get really hot. Anyway once I got parked up I took a look under the engine to see how my new thermostat was looking and check it was operating okay. It was absolutely destroyed and looks as though it swelled up so much it distorted the bracket, melted the solder and rendered it completely shagged. Just wondered if anyone else had encountered this problem before? The only thing I can think of is that its description when I bought it was, "for beetle but can be altered for T25". Its operating temp is 60 degrees whereas the original one was 90 degrees. Camped up in the yorkshire dales at the moment but will post a pic when I've got a bit more signal.

[Hasis]

Oh great, did you follow these instructions?

http://www.germansupply.com/xcart/custo ... _in_t4.tpl

The image shows the Dub 'replacement' opens at 65-70*C instead of 85-90*C, but the narrative states that this means that the flaps will just open a bit sooner than with the [obsolete] OEM thermo. No mention of ballooning itself to destruction at all.

My new thermostat arrives tomorrow and it certainly wasn't cheap enough as I would shrug off something like this to happening!

Any tips on this would be gratefully received by me too.

H

PS. Hope you're enjoying the Dales regardless T?

[Hasis]

Tamson, if you make sure that you keep the batch number of your thermo , when mine arrives this afternoon I'll do the boiling water test on it. If mine fails in a similar fashion - and it's the same batch number - then you'll probably have a better case for compensation.

If they were cheap I wouldn't mind so much.

Does this make sense peeps?

[Hasis]

My thermostat has now arrived. I've dutifully dunked it into a pot of hot water and watched as it's popped erect [ ] and then collapsed exactly as anticipated.
I have to say that my suspicion is that Tamson's 'ballooned' because the 'spud' and wire got trapped in the bracket somehow, thus forcing the thermostat to expand sideways rather than straight as designed.

I'm going to be double and triple checking the fit of the thermo in its bracket on Floss now and I hope T gets sorted too.

[tamson]

Thats a good point when you said the "spud" got caught on the bracket. This was the second thermostat I have fitted, the first one split down one of the folds. I installed the new one with the brass cable retainer that came with it rather than the one off my original thermostat as it didnt fit. I'll email vw heritage with a pic and see what they say. The engine was mega hot. I checked the timing at one of the campsites and it was 18 degrees ATDC! Might explain it getting so hot. Ran a hell of alot better once I rectified that. Holiday was still ace though once I got over the sting off chucking fifty quid away!

[tamson]

Heres what my thermostat looked like!