Well took her out for a long spin and she overheated.... Coolant was boiling in the coolant expansion tank. Coming out the cap! Seemed to be fine in park and neutral but would climb as soon as there was a load on the engine (drive). Did a deep flush twice with prestone coolant flush, blew out all coolant lines and radiator (adapter I made) with 150 psi compressor. Idled fine past 2 days (30+ minutes) and quick spins around the block. She ran great! New fan clutch, electric fans work, tstat, water pump, had new coolant and water wetter. Idles good at 780-800, can see coolant level lower when throttled, upper hose has good pressure (not to stiff). Thought I had it fixed... Maybe trans is all clogged up? Not circulating coolant right? Shifts smooth and has no weird noises. Gonna drop the tranny pan this weekend and check everything out. ZERO oil in the coolant and ZERO coolant in the oil.... Any ideas?

 

Is the t-stat a new 180 with the bleed hole at 12 o'clock? Did you run the passenger side tire up on a ramp/curb to help bleed the air out? I did the bleed with a 3/4" pvc male to female connector/funnel screwed into the radiator. Mine is still running a little warmer than I'd like and my next step is having the radiator rodded out.
John

 

Got the 180 tstat but has no hole? I Did do the ramp trick and replaced radiator plastic plug with the doorman metal plug. Should I drill a hole in the tstat? The old one did have one with a little nipple thing. Lol. Even tried running it with no tstat... Same issue!

 

you can drill the hole and add the jiggler thing, be sure thespring part of the stat is facing into the engine

remove the plug from rad and cap from bottle with the pass from elevevated

is the cap on the bottle good? gets tight?

tilt the rad back and see if airflow is blocked by leaves, common

did your other thread say you fixed the headgaskets? if so how?

in the end it may be that the rad is clogged with calcium and needs rebuild or replace

i run the aluminum with plastic bowels direct fit no problems, they are around $200 new on ebay

 

btw 150 psi through a system designed for like 20??? or less probly not such a good idea, you may have caused damage imo , block is aluminum with steel sleeves, you could have blown a weak headgasket doing that, just sayin

 

a T-stat with the hole and giggle pin is $8 - hardly worth modifying one. I just changed mine on level ground and refilled with the rad plug out to watch the level and it seemed to work OK with no problems.

Not sure why yours is OK at extended idle but not in drive unless there is a head gasket problem that comes in above idle or the trans is adding a lot of heat when moving. Be interested to hear what you find.

 

The rad is the only thing blown out with 150 psi comp. Not the engine. Geez... The tstat is not my concern right now. Pulled it and still running hot. Gonna service the trans and blow out the lines to see if it makes any difference. Next step is to replace rad and head gasket...

 

I'm curious to know why the trans is a concern?

 

Hmm, maybe because the trans uses coolant to cool it too? Just my edumacated guestimation. Unless you know something I don't?

 

I don't know anything. Just making educated guesses based on your info trying to help you out. Every single thing I've said could be totally wrong. Just trying to brainstorm and get your problem solved. I've had many of my problems solved due to the guys on this forum taking time to help me out. And I'm greatful for it.

I'm aware the trans is cooled by the Coolant. But so is the engine oil. So the majority of the work being done is cooling the engine. The majority of the heat made is being made by the engine. If the trans were getting hot enough to overheat the engine you'd have a serious trans problem. At that point it probably wouldn't shift and or slip like crazy or make such a problem obvious. Is the fluid really burnt? If it's generating that sort of heat the fluid should be black molasses.

I've personally never heard or seen a transmission be responsible for an engine overheat. Again just based on my experience. Typically when you have a overheat while driving (under load) and you've eliminated the obvious, you've got a head gasket issue. Just a guess at this point.

Just a thought I wouldn't flush any automatic transmission. There are many good arguments against such a thing. But I'm sure there are some who swear it's fine. I'd do a simple drain fill and then a filter change drain and fill again.