I have seen this happen: The impeller blades spining loosely on the shaft with cheap Water pumps.I have also seen the impellers literally rotted down to un recognizeable strips of steel.(yours isnt old enough for this) but it is a fairly low cost one.You may have bolckage in the block or the wp isnt pushing enough volume to allow the giant radiator to do its job well.Big Aluminum rads require high volume pumps to work best.Sounds like a lack of volume/flow due to a under par water pump or blockage somewhere.Good luck.
i was thinking about it while towing my sons friends dodge intrepid out of the sandy back desert with my highboy, was your fan relay not working correctly and not kicking into high on occasion? BTW i think im going to get one of those fans for my high boy as eveyone online is running those with better luck than anything aftermarket. meanwhile my wussy dual fans arent strong enough for back country off roading while towing a car (had to stop and let it cool a couple times)
You ran into a snow storm and the snow melted then refroze into a sheet of ice, thus blocking air flow thru the fins.
I just noticed Rthomas771 said it first, but if he declines the prize it's yours, fastback86. Make it somethin' good! I got an infrared thermometer, and no matter where I measured, it was at least 20 degrees cooler than what the gauge said. Apparently, the reason I couldn't find a problem in my cooling system is... There's not one. The gauge is junk. I just installed a new one, different brand. Now I'm waiting for the car to cool down so I can put my thermostat back in, then I'll go for a ride and see what the new gauge tells me. Now, I could still be wrong. The infrared thermometer I bought is cheap junk too. If the new gauge tells me the same thing the old one did, then I'm pulling the water pump tonight. I expect it won't though.
Pre-launch test... Thermostat is in, coolant is in, no bubbles, ready to go. Granted ambient temps aren't as high as they were earlier today, but it's still about 86 degrees outside and that sure was enough to get that gauge up last night. Idling in the garage for about 20 minutes, air conditioner on, the temp got up to 190. That's when my electric fan kicked in, then it dropped down and stablized at 187, according to the new temp gauge. I checked the infrared thermometer at the water neck, and it read about the same as the gauge. So far, so good. But all this means nothing until I actually drive it. So that's what I'm gonna do now...
...I drove it hard around a 15 mile circuit that included 4-lane highway, (55mph) 2-lane back road (40mph) and a long stretch of interstate (75-95mph...ish) and although I tried hard, I could not get it above 207. AC on the whole time. Average cruising temp was 195-205. It will likely be higher in the daytime, but nowhere near what the other gauge said. So. I have spent the past few days doing battle with a non-existent cooling problem. I did seal up the hood to the cowl, and to the radiator support, and those actually made a difference, so that's good. But there's a moral to this story. I spent about $20 on antifreeze, $12 on two different radiator caps, (16 and 18lb) another $13 on a heater control valve, ('cause the 18lb cap caused the old one to burst) $15 on weatherstripping, $25 on a digital infrared thermometer, and $18 for a new temp gauge. Total bill: $103 not including my wasted time, for a problem that didn't exist. All because I saved a few bucks on a $13.99 no-name gauge set from Harbor Freight.
im just glad we kept you from yanking all the front off to get to the water pump first, it sucks with that big ac bracket...
I have the same gauge set :16suspect Sometime mine doesn't move off the low end as the car is warming up, like there's an air pocket in there. When I first started reading I thought it was the radiator, especially since you kept ruling it out and "assumed" it was not the problem. I had one get plugged with rtv because I used too much to seal everything up once, and it acted the same way. Glad you found the problem I hope Rthomas771 comes up with something, I don't do well under pressure
Yes... I am glad too. I just was so baffled though! I thought I'd ruled out everything but the water pump, but that didn't make sense either. So I got you folks involved. Good move, as usual. Man, you're right. That AC bracket gets in the way of everything. The left bolt on the thermostat housing, the distributor hold-down bolt, the power steering pump, and as if the water pump wasn't a big enough pain already, it makes it ten times worse. I still have the HF oil pressure gauge and ammeter that came with the set, and I've used this set on another car before without any trouble. I doubt all their temp gauges are bad, but I would suggest getting a second opinion... Another gauge, thermometer, etc and see if they agree. At some point I will replace the other two gauges just 'cause I want them to match. Bummer too 'cause I like the way the HF gauges look. Yeah, the radiator was always in the back of my mind, but if you saw this thing you'd doubt it too. It would really take a lot of crud to block this radiator in any meaningful way, enough that I would see it floating around in there, or notice it during one of the six or so times I siphoned it out. (Yeah, it has no drain. Good thing antifreeze is tasty!)
I'm not gonna say anything silly (I hope) like eating duct tape... I will say "You can't take parts off a red Ford and put them on a blue Ford...they won't fit." ----or--- "A bad gauge is better than a crack head"
