I'm having cooling problems. My car runs hotter at highway speed than it does at idle. Before I made the below changes my car cruised at 180-190 and would creep up to as high as 210 at lights in 100* weather. Now... its 65* and will idle at 190 and creep up to 210-220 while driving. (maybe higher as I am only driving 15 minutes at a time right now) Complete changes made are: "used" Griffin alum rad replaced stock serpentine belt system from March Performance replaced stock belt system. (new water pump was included) Taurus elec. fan replaced stock mech fan. Ive watched the coolant flow in the rad as the thermo (180*) opens up and ensured levels are topped off. The lower hose is not collapsing either. I'm trying to make it to the Texas mini-meet this Saturday and am not making a mad dash to get this working properly. Why do I put myself thru this? As usual, thanks for the advice.
Water flowing through Rad too fast??? Try a 195 Thermostat? Bigger waterpump pulley to slow things down?
Is the waterpump and fan assembly right to work together? Some are reverse rotation on later model stuff.
As far as I can tell the fan runs at HWY speeds. Any time the temp reaches about 190, the fan comes on. Even if the fan wasnt running at HWY speeds the air flow should still be enough to keep it running cool. The speed at which the coolent flows makes sense being that the higher the RMP the hotter it gets. But then again, higher RMP's generate more heat that needs to be evacuated.
This is a reverse rotation water pump and an electric fan. Here is the pulley system. It is not underdrive. It came with a large diameter crank pulley to provide better accessory drive. http://www.marchperf.com/styletrack_ford_sb.html Per the March tech line. The pulley ratio should be in line with the factory. They have not heard of any instances of the water pump pushing the water thru too fast. The radiator was purchased used from a fellow Mavericker who reports he did not have any cooling problems when running it. Though he was using a mech fan and not elec. This leave a possible problem being the fan shroud/radiator configuration. I trimmed the shroud significantly to make it fit the way I needed it. Might it be so close to the radiator that it alter the flow of the cruising air thru the fins?
Could be timing set too high. Could be running too lean. Could be low octane fuel. Could be a vacuum leak. Could be a head gasket leaking exhaust in the water passage. I had a new thermostat a few weeks old go bad and didn't open completely.
The reason I asked was I wonder if the running fan is actually impeding the air flow at highway speeds.
Lets explore the vacuum leak idea. I also put my vacuum canister back on with the above listed changes. Have I introduced a vacuum leak into the problem. Could this be it?
when i built my motor i thought i had put a 160 t-stat in. it would start running in the 200s on the freeway (i have alum rad, elec water pump, escort fan) i pull the the t-stat and found it to be a 190. the parts store sent the wrong one to me and i never checked. i put a 160 in and now it never goes above 180. i recomend trying a 160 stat and seeing if it makes the difference
I have an aluminum radiator in mine with the stock pully setup and it will only got up to 160 in traffic on a 85 degree day. The motor does not have a termostat in it. try taking out the t stat out just to see if that helps.
Just to verify your water pump rotation is correct with your pulley setup, I would pull the top hose of the radiator and let it run until the Tstat opens and make sure the water comes out of the hose instead of trying to suck water through the hose. I put on a serpentine kit from march but I did not get the 5.0 style kit where the belt wraps under the water pump pulley, it wraps around the pulley like a v belt. When I installed this kit I used a 5.0 mustang pump and had similar problems to what you are having. ended up the pump was reverse rotation and with the way I have my belt routed I needed to stay with a standard rotation but had to get the crown vic pump so the march pulley bracket stuff would mount correctly.
Is the fan a pusher or puller? Is it wired up right? I know you probably know what you are doing, but I just want to throw out there that if the fan is wired backwards, often times it will run fine, but run backwards. This would keep air pretty much static in forward motion, but would cool sitting still. You would also have this issue if you set up a pusher as a puller, or vise-versa. Just a thought.
You got a picture of the pulley kit on your car? I looked at the link you provided in one of your replys and the belt routes under the water pump, which wold need the reverse rotation. But if that is not the exact kit or you routed the belt differently because of not using some of the accessories then you might need a different pump.
Ryan, that is the EXACT kit minus the power steering. The belt is routing under the water pump pulley which turns it in the op direction of the crank pulley. It came with the water pump so I am 99.99% sure it is the correct one. That and I believe they only make the short nose pump in the reverse style. Ratio: The fan is set up as a puller. I place my hand on the engine side of the fan and you can feel the air blowing. Im now wondering if my gauge might be bad. Its just odd how the gauge once it hits operating temp, reacting to the throttle as quickly as Oil Pressure and Voltage do. Its instantaneous.
