over heating

[sqhertz 5,000+ posts]

well i took it on a ride to the part store to pick up an air filter (mine looked like poo).

temp gauge got to the 2/3 (~245-250) point then jumped back down to around halfway (~190-220) and stayed there. so i guess the thermostat is doing its job but i still dont know where the coolant is going.

 

[jdawg 5,000+ posts]

is your pass side floorboard wet?

 

[sqhertz 5,000+ posts]

shouldnt be. the heater core is bypassed.

 

[jdawg 5,000+ posts]

did you put a new cap on it?

 

[sqhertz 5,000+ posts]

yezzir.

 

[jdawg 5,000+ posts]

hmm, has to be either a leak or its going inside the engine somewhere, might hace to do like others suggested, put a peice of cardboard under it and let it run for a min and look for drips

 

[sqhertz 5,000+ posts]

thats what im thinking. my boy and i looked for a good 10 minutes while it was running and saw nothing leaking.

ill probably get around to doing that today and see. atleast it is running cooler.

 

[jdawg 5,000+ posts]

you may have a cracked head or leaky headgasket, I would say just baby it, keep a jug of water in your truck till the end of the year and trade the sucker in

 

[Rich B 5,000+ posts]

Take it to a gas station that still has service bays and ask them to pressure test your coolant system.

They have a hand pump device with a pressure guage thats attached to a special radiator cap, where they can pump it up to see if it holds pressure.

If its not holding pressure, they might be able to find the leak.

 

[jdawg 5,000+ posts]

I was looking around on s10forum and seems like the 4.3's have a problem with leaky intake gaskets

 

[sqhertz 5,000+ posts]

i wasnt really looking for leaking gaskets when i was in there but i did look around and didnt notice anything.

just got back from another ride and before i left i checked the level again and it dropped but it does seem to stay around where the lower radiator hose is so the leak may be around there.now its starting to rain a bit so ill have to hold off on that.

the temp does seem to stay where its supposed to be untill i start driving further distances. so ima do like jdawg suggested and baby it till i can trade it in. bah, i cant wait.

thanks again for all the help. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif

 

[Ignatowski 5,000+ posts]

the water is going into the cylinder either though the head gasket or a cracked head,....see my previous post on PG 2 to further diagnose.......Eventually you'll hydrolock and end up

having to re do the whole motor instead of just the head/gasket...I build engines for hobby/race and have seen this many times

Stupid is as stupid does

 

[Ferendon 10+ year member]

I dunno man i read that statement a few times and haven't come up with a conclusion. You are the first to ever tell me that coolant doesn't burn. I know coolant has a lifted boiling point, but if combustion temps reach say 1600º F and said coolant is entering that flame front i would imagine it getting burned, it getting pushed out the exhaust valve(s) and it venting a white cloud of sweet smelling smoke(steam?) to the atmosphere.
Not flaming you at all, would just like to know your side of this!

Sorry for hijacking thread

It's coolant... What is coolant's purpose? To cool the engine. If a normal combustion chamber, gets to 1600*, then how hot would a cylinder get, with a wet spark plug, and coolant on the piston, and cylinder wall? A wet spark plug doesn't spark, at least not very well. No fire = no heat = much lower combustion chamber temp. Each spark would burn off a tiny, and I mean TINY bit of coolant. By the time you burned off any significant amount of coolant, you would have typically caused some engine damage.

The sweet smelling steam is a result of the silicates from the coolant breaking down, over time, and mixing with water. Kinda like when you boil something, after a while, you can smell w/e is in the water. Water in the combustion chamber is turned to steam, and carries the silicates with it, which creates the smell.

My dad was a mechanic for 32 years, so while I'm no expert, I don't just talk out of my *** either. I changed my first set of brake pads when I was 4, and I did it without removing the caliper from the mounting bracket, and I've been up to my elbows in grease ever since.

 

[sqhertz 5,000+ posts]

the truck is overheating again. so im calling off work to get this figured out.

bad gaskets- what do i look for? just cracks and leaks around the heads?

wouldnt starting the engine with a spark plug out cause something to **** up? just doesnt sound too safe to me, but i dont know much about engines so...

 

[azimuth 5,000+ posts]

i had the same thing happen to my sonoma. it was the head gasket. i noticed fluid coming out of the tail pipe (although i'm not entirely sure that it wasn't just condensation). my pops did a "die test" i think and found out it was the gasket. cost 600$ to fix it.