Questionmy car has been getting hotter than normal and sometimes reaches HOT while my A/C gets warmer when I am idle and also during idle time my oil light flickers and my car does a slight lunge. I can almost always smell radiator when I get out of the car. I live in Florida and I know the hot days may cause somewhat of warmer temps, but I use my car to make home visits and really need repair. I recently got a new radiator and just last week replace the oil sending unit. Thank you for this website and for any help.
AnswerHi Amy,
All the symptoms you describe are associated with the temperature of the coolant going too high. The oil pressure too will drop when the oil gets hotter than usual. So how do we lower the temperature? I would look in to at least four possibilities: do you have sufficient coolant in the overflow bottle (there are lines on the side that you should have the coolant level in between, using a 50/50 mixture of antifreeze/water). Are there any signs of coolant loss under the engine compartment such as from a leak? (There will be plain water under the car after you have been running the air conditioner; I mean colored coolant on the ground?) Do you get an unusal amount of white smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe when you start the car from cold?
Then there are two other possibilities: there could be air trapped in the cooling system from not having it filled properly after the radiator was replaced. On the way to get air out:
It would be good to start with only a partially filled system, so drain off three quarts from the radiator drain.
Then notice that the thermostat housing has a bleed valve and a nipple from which you can drain fluid. Put a 4' length of clear plastic hose on the nipple and direct the hose over the front of the car to a clean container to catch the coolant. Then open the bleed valve. Then slowly fill the coolant recovery bottle until fluid starts to flow out of the clear hose. The gently squeeze on the top radiator hose until all the air is exhausted from the system. Close the bleed valve and fill the system the rest of the way until it reaches the to of the overflow on the bottle. Remove the hose from the bleeder valve nipple. You might be able to get the shop who did the radiator replacement to do this procedure for free, if they didn't do it right the first time.
Another possibilitiy is that the thermostat is opening at too high a temperature. This would be noticeable when you are driving at night or on cool days, and if you still notice the car runs hot. If it doesn't then this is probably not the cause of your problem. But observe how the gauge reads when it is cool outside as a test of this possibility.
The last thing is simple to observe: when the temp gauge goes up to about 3/4 scale or more are the cooling fans behind the radiator coming on or not?
So let me know what you learn, please.
You can get back to me via the "thank/rate" tab below where there is a section for comments.
Roland
