brian.evans
New Member
The car is a bone stock 93 LX auto trans.
I'm a paramedic and work 24 hours on, 48 hours off. Basically, I drive 50 miles to work, shut it off for 24 hours, drive 50 miles home, shut it off for 48 hours. Sometimes it gets driven for errands on off days, but not usually.
Three days ago, drove it home and it was fine. Yesterday, my wife drove it for errands and says the temp came up to normal and the heater worked just fine. (Who knows if thats truly the case however, as she isn't very car savvy. I'd assume she would have complained about the heater not working if it wasn't warming up though.) Last night we went to a track meet for my son. It was cold, but not overly. About 30F. I started the car and let it warm up for about 10 minutes or so with the heater off. When we got in the car I noted the temp gauge was about halfway between the bottom bar of the temp gauge and the middle of the gauge. That is normal. It doesn't usually warm up all the way until I drive it for a couple miles. Been like that since I bought it a year ago.
We started driving and I waited for it to get up to temp to turn the heater on. But it never did! The temp dropped like a rock! Down below the C on the gauge. And there is where it stayed the entire time we were driving. Heater blew cold to barely more than cold air. We drove about 15 minutes and parked it. With the car stopped and the heater off the temp slowly creeped back upward, but never got more than a couple needle widths above the bottom hash mark.
Today I drove it to work. The needle hung out right on top of the C. Stopped the car about halfway to work, crept upwards while stopped, then dropped again after I took off, but not as far down. The heater blew warm enough to knock the chill off, but that's about it. Usually it will burn a guy out of the car it's so hot. The fan wasn't on when I checked it halfway, nor when I arrived at work.
A week and a half ago I replaced the radiator, top and bottom hose, radiator cap, thermostat, oil, coolant (duh right?), and trans fluid.
It has ran in excess of 450 miles since then without a hitch, until the last 16 hours. I'm stuck for ideas. It's like the engine isn't heating the coolant properly. Both hoses are warm, top more so than bottom, but both warm. Radiator is topped off, engine was bleed with the bleeder valve and by alternating squeezing the top and bottom hoses with the cap off while pouring fluid in. Engine seems to be running fine, the valve cover was not as warm to touch as usual, but I'm honestly not sure if truly is cooler to touch, or if I'm making it up in my head given the other stuff going on. All cables/cords seem to be in place and hooked up.
I'm really stumped for ideas. We are planning on taking it to Mayo on Monday, which is about 9 hours from us. I'd really like to figure it out so I don't have to take the suburban and its 15 mpg V8. Any ideas/help on where to start trouble shooting would be very much appreciated.
I'm a paramedic and work 24 hours on, 48 hours off. Basically, I drive 50 miles to work, shut it off for 24 hours, drive 50 miles home, shut it off for 48 hours. Sometimes it gets driven for errands on off days, but not usually.
Three days ago, drove it home and it was fine. Yesterday, my wife drove it for errands and says the temp came up to normal and the heater worked just fine. (Who knows if thats truly the case however, as she isn't very car savvy. I'd assume she would have complained about the heater not working if it wasn't warming up though.) Last night we went to a track meet for my son. It was cold, but not overly. About 30F. I started the car and let it warm up for about 10 minutes or so with the heater off. When we got in the car I noted the temp gauge was about halfway between the bottom bar of the temp gauge and the middle of the gauge. That is normal. It doesn't usually warm up all the way until I drive it for a couple miles. Been like that since I bought it a year ago.
We started driving and I waited for it to get up to temp to turn the heater on. But it never did! The temp dropped like a rock! Down below the C on the gauge. And there is where it stayed the entire time we were driving. Heater blew cold to barely more than cold air. We drove about 15 minutes and parked it. With the car stopped and the heater off the temp slowly creeped back upward, but never got more than a couple needle widths above the bottom hash mark.
Today I drove it to work. The needle hung out right on top of the C. Stopped the car about halfway to work, crept upwards while stopped, then dropped again after I took off, but not as far down. The heater blew warm enough to knock the chill off, but that's about it. Usually it will burn a guy out of the car it's so hot. The fan wasn't on when I checked it halfway, nor when I arrived at work.
A week and a half ago I replaced the radiator, top and bottom hose, radiator cap, thermostat, oil, coolant (duh right?), and trans fluid.
It has ran in excess of 450 miles since then without a hitch, until the last 16 hours. I'm stuck for ideas. It's like the engine isn't heating the coolant properly. Both hoses are warm, top more so than bottom, but both warm. Radiator is topped off, engine was bleed with the bleeder valve and by alternating squeezing the top and bottom hoses with the cap off while pouring fluid in. Engine seems to be running fine, the valve cover was not as warm to touch as usual, but I'm honestly not sure if truly is cooler to touch, or if I'm making it up in my head given the other stuff going on. All cables/cords seem to be in place and hooked up.
I'm really stumped for ideas. We are planning on taking it to Mayo on Monday, which is about 9 hours from us. I'd really like to figure it out so I don't have to take the suburban and its 15 mpg V8. Any ideas/help on where to start trouble shooting would be very much appreciated.
