I haven't been driving my car for about 2.5 weeks now because I've been having overheating issues. I first noticed it overheating while driving up a narrow, slightly rough trail in back of a hunting lodge. The trail is designed for cars but it's fairly narrow in spots and quite winding. Anyway, I was just slowly driving along this trail in first gear and I noticed the car started to overheat. I stopped in a clearing and noticed water was spilling out of the engine, from the coolant bottle I assume. I should point out that at the time, I was running pure water and Prestone super cleaner. I let the car sit for a minute or so then got back in and headed back down the trail. Well, it kept overheating, and at one point lost heat output from the heater. I had no choice but to drive like this until I found a little pond at the side of the road. I filled up a few bottles I had in the car, topped off the coolant bottle and drove back home. On the drive home, it worked fine.
When I got home, I again let the car sit for a few minutes, then went out to Canadian Tire and bougt some Motomaster extended life coolant and some Redline Water Wetter. I got back home and set out to drain the coolant. I had a difficult time actually draining it, all I had for tools were just a few screwdrivers and a pair of pliers. I detached the bottom radiator hose from where it attaches to the water pump and let the water/super flush mix drain out. After letting it drain out, I reattached the bottom hose to the water pump. It was another struggle to get the hose back on. This would have been easier if I first put the car up on ramps! With the hose reattached, I filled the coolant system back up and added the water wetter. A few days go by, and then my starter dies on me. Never had any trouble starting before then one day it just died. I had a spare starter in the back so I swapped them out, but it turns out the solenoid on the spare starter was different than the one that was on the starter that came out of the car (yes I am going somewhere with this!).
When I reattached the wires to this different solenoid, the starter motor would spin constantly, even without turning the key to start, but it wouldn't kick the little gear out to engage the flywheel. I call Canadian Tire looking for a solenoid. The one in town didn't have one, but another Canadian Tire store about 80 miles away did. I decided to drive up to this other CT store to get the solenoid. I 'disabled' the starter in the car and set out. Now this is the point where I start to notice cooling system trouble. I get about 20 miles out and noticed the coolant light flashing. I pull into a gas station, add water then head out again. Another 15 or so miles pass and I start overheating. I pull over, add more water then take off. Another 15 miles and overheating. I pull over, add more water then go again.
It did this another few times before I got to the CT store. Well, I get up there, go to the parts counter and ask for the solenoid. Oh sorry, we don't have it in stock! **** **** ****! i traveled all the way for nothing! I was just a little pissed off so I decided to just go home. I get outside and notice a puddle of water underneath my car. Luckily I had my dad with me so we start prodding trying to find the source of the leak. Turns out my bypass hose was rotted and had a split right by the oil cooler. Well ****, I can't drive the car home now! I had to call my brother and he begrudgingly came up to give me a ride home.
I went to a junkyard the next day and got a bypass hose off a 91 TD Jetta. Me and my brother and my dad head back up to rescue my poor car. We get the hose attached, fill up with water (plain water) and head for home. I get about 15 miles down the road and wouldn't ya know it, I overheated again. DAMMIT, what's wrong now? None of the hoses seemed to be leaking, but it looked like water was being pushed out of the coolant bottle. I topped off the water and set out. About 15 miles down the road, it was overheating. I topped up, and went back out. It did this a bunch of times and eventually I just decided to leave it at a gas station about 20 miles from home overnight and try bringing it back the next day. Next day, me and my brother head back to rescue the damn car. He removed the thermostat, thinking that on normal cars this would help the car stay cooler, but apparently doing this on our engines is bad. Well we set off for home and of course every 10-15 miles I had to stop to add water. It looks like it's just constantly pushing water out of the coolant bottle. It did this about another half dozen times before I finally got home.
Well at this point I figure the head or headgasket is gone. I took the thermostat that was in the car and boil it in some water and it does open and close normally. Thinking back now, it seems to be the problems really started when I removed that bottom rad from from the water pump, filled my coolant system then reattached the hose. Maybe I didn't get the hose on too good? I've noticed that since I've had the car it's always seemed to run a but hot, a couple times just driving up hills on the highway it's gone a bit past 210F but always came back down. I had a problem quite similar to this on a Dodge Spirit and it turned out the radiator was bad, a replacement rad was put in and never had issues again. The old radiator on the Spirit had a lot of rotted and missing fins on it, I don't think the rad in my Golf is that bad. I posted on the vwdieselparts forum and people there that they think either my water pump or radiator is bad.
I don't notice any steam coming from the tailpipe, the engine still seems to run normally and there's no increase in the oil level so maybe it is just my water pump or radiator? What do you people think?
With it getting hot that many times, I'd pull the head and have it checked and get a new gasket, take the rad and flush it as well.
Pull the head, hmm, sounds expensive.
wait a minute... you ran the car with pure water and prestone super cleaner?
:shock:
when i removed the condensor from in front of my rad there seemed to be a 'nest' of mud etc... cleaned that & flushed the system and voila. most of my heating problems were gone (aside from changing my broken oil cooler/warmer)
did you get the air out of the system when re-filling? i didn't know about that myself... and had an air lock in the system. i managed to get it out by running the car up to temp with the rad cap off. the proper way of doing it is to pull the rad hose from the head and fill that, and then fill the motor, and then run it to burp it.
have you verified that the rad fan is coming on??? is your car turbo or non turbo?
wait a minute... you ran the car with pure water and prestone super cleaner? :shock:
Yes, yes I did. I suppose that's a bad thing?
did you get the air out of the system when re-filling? i didn't know about that myself... and had an air lock in the system. i managed to get it out by running the car up to temp with the rad cap off. the proper way of doing it is to pull the rad hose from the head and fill that, and then fill the motor, and then run it to burp it.
Uhh, I don't know if I did get all the air out. I know I certainly didn't fill the coolant system the way you describe.. If I fill the coolant system then idle it with the cap off until the level stabilizes then everything seems normal but then once I drive for 15 minutes it then it starts having trouble.
have you verified that the rad fan is coming on??? is your car turbo or non turbo?
For a time, it was...then it stopped working. I ran a power wire from the battery to the fan motor but it still overheated. The engine is a 1.6 TD.
is the rad getting hot? when my oil cooler went it was giving me some problems like you describe. PITA to change if you have a/c, but not if your a/c lines are ripped out :wink:.
if your rad is getting hot and the fan is coming on, then theres something seriously wrong there as the fan should be sufficiently cooling the rad. and if you've directly wired the fan to the high speed then cooling shouldn't be an issue.
i think the oil cooler goes when some meat head jerks on the oil filters... so word of caution - change your oil yourself and be gentle... just do the 3/4 turn after it starts tightening up. that way you're not reefing on it to get it off the next time. after all it is a hollow piece of aluminum :shock: and apparently it is a regular replacement item and considered a weak point. double shock! :shock: :shock: :lol:
The rad did get hot, but when the car started overheating, the rad was cold as was the bottom radiator hose. No A/C on my car. How much does a new oil cooler cost?
I picked up a water pump and thermostat today from the VW specialists in town. 80 bucks, taxes in, for a genuine German Hepu water pump and a Wahler thermostat. I mentioned my overheating problem to one person working there. He said it could be the headgasket. He then asked me if I was getting any flow out of the little return hose. I told him I wasn't, he told me some of those return hoses have a check ball about 1 inch from the end of the hose and to cut it past this check ball then try it again. I've already replaced that hose with a cheap Canadian Tire replacement. I then asked about the coolant tank cap and he didn't think that a bad cap could cause my overheating.
I'm going to try to finish removing the water pump tomorrow. There's 2 bolts left on the old one that neither me or my dad could get off last time we tried. You know the ones I'm talking about, the 2 top ones? Those ones that are hard to get at? I figure I'll need an 'S' wrench or maybe a flexible joint socket thing to get at them. Anyone know how to get at those 2 without having to remove the IP?
take a cheap metric wrench and bend it about 80 degreees or so for the inner bolt. The other bolt can be taken off with 1/4 inch with a swivel.
wait a minute... you ran the car with pure water and prestone super cleaner? :shock:
Yes, yes I did. I suppose that's a bad thing?
I'm afraid so. Certain areas of the head (exhaust port, prechamber) get way hotter than the boiling point of water. Without coolant to bring the boiling point up, the water boils and flashes to steam in these areas. Steam does not cool as well as water, so that area gets even hotter.
Once you get a 50/50 distilled water + coolant mix in there, and it still overheats, it's time to pull the head. Best case: headgasket. Worst case: cracked head. In between is a warped head.