When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
As title says, car overheated per the coolant gauge.
Scenario: 79 degrees out, went to drivethru 1.5 miles from my house. Idled for probably 4-5 minutes in drivethru, pull out and next thing I know my coolant gauge read hot as attached pic shows. Since I was so close to home, I babied it back and shut the car off immediately when I got home (honestly don’t know the proper procedure of what to do when your car is “overheating”)
edit: I should also note I didn’t have the AC on, was only riding windows down enjoying the “cool” weather
Here’s the weird thing. I’m in south Florida where it’s hot as **** out. This is my daily driver and I’ve been driving it daily in 90+ degree heat and humidity, with no overheating. Only thing is since it’s so hot out, the fans usually stay on for a few mins after I shut the car off, which I have read is normal. But when I just got home from the car overheating, the fans didn’t stay on when I shut it off which I found to be very odd.
Only thing I've done so far is check my coolant level, which was slightly above the “max” line(not sure if that’s an issue, but I’ll take some out in case)
edit 2: Opened radiator cap this morning and there was fluid in it. Did some research and read that turning the heater on helps to cool car down when it overheats. So I did a test around my neighborhood and sure enough it doesn’t overheat with the heater on, but immediately does when I shut it off. Thinking I'm going to start off by replacing the thermostat. If it is the issue, I'm not sure how quality OEM thermostats are considering it'll be the 2nd one I've replaced in 50,000 miles. Had an issue 2 years ago where the thermostat was getting stuck open so the car wouldn't warm up completely. Am wondering if this time the thermostat is stuck closed.
I'd make sure your fan comes on at all. If running the heat helps, you probably have coolant flow.
Fans do come on. I also figured if fan wasn’t running, then the air coming through from driving would help cool it but when I was cruising back home, temp didn’t go down at all so it overheats whether I’m moving or idling.
Looks like I’ll start with the thermostat as it might be stuck closed.
Like others have stated, Check the Thermostat.
There Pretty cheap and I've had to replace them in all my past vehicles at some point.
They are really simple to swap out.
Turning on heater basically moves the cooling of the liquid to the Heater core.
Whats probably happening the thermostat is stuck shut and not allowing the coolant to circulate to the radiator.
Like others have stated, Check the Thermostat.
There Pretty cheap and I've had to replace them in all my past vehicles at some point.
They are really simple to swap out.
Turning on heater basically moves the cooling of the liquid to the Heater core.
Whats probably happening the thermostat is stuck shut and not allowing the coolant to circulate to the radiator.
Planning on it.
Seems pretty basic except I have to drain the coolant first which is somewhat of a hassle. Aside from that looks like I only need to remove part of my intake to access the thermostat housing and take off a radiator hose.
If anyone’s curious, it ended up being the thermostat. Sure enough it was stuck closed. Pretty basic job, I didn’t even remove my intake (ETS) or take off the lower radiator hose from the housing. Just didn’t have a lot of room to access the bolts on the thermostat housing.
Also, when Mitsubishi replaced my thermostat when it was stuck open a few years back and car was still under warranty, they put a “MotoRad” thermostat in the car instead of OEM. Looks like some autozone bull****, no wonder it only lasted a few years. The temp on it says 82C/180F, so at least it opened at the same temp as OEM. Insane they’d put a non OEM part on the car, can’t say I’m surprised though.
Aug 16, 2019, 06:33 PM
