still overheating and being weird (Page 3/16) Yellow-88 JUN 10, 09:17 AM This is a fascinating thread. Hoses blowing of the engine! Boiling over! Your thinking it's the fam? Problem solving is a process. I'd probably start here. Is coolant circulating? Is the radiator getting hot? If so is it hotter going in then coming out? Chasing one's tail just makes one dizzy. cartercarbaficionado JUN 10, 06:10 PM quote Originally posted by armos: V6 Fieros don't have dual-speed fans, so if it's running slow, something is wrong. Maybe somebody installed the wrong fan? I don't know how easily someone could have done that, I've never looked into it. I don't know offhand how to tell the fans apart visually, but I'd look into the differences and try to confirm if you have the right one. I think only 84 Fieros have dual-speed fans. Assuming you have the right fan: Check the voltage at the fan, if it's ~12V but fan is slow or stopped, replace the fan. If voltage is low, measure again with the fan disconnected. If voltage comes back to 12V or more without the fan connected, then it could be a bad fan or it could be the car. If voltage is still low without the fan connected, then the fan isn't the problem. In that case trace back the electrical problem. I haven't checked schematics but there's probably a relay involved somewhere. Also check for loose/frayed wiring. If the car intermittently stops powering the fan, then momentum could make it still look like it's running but it's not pushing much air anymore until it powers up again. With AC switched on, the car should supply a constant 12V to the fan causing it to run at full speed continuously. Since it doesn't do that, either the car is not supplying the constant 12V or the fan is failing. A more powerful fan isn't needed for a stock engine, and could just aggravate the electrical issue that may be present. My air dam is mostly missing and the stock fan has no problem keeping the car cool, the condition of the air dam only means I have to turn it on more often. Cleaning the radiator is fine, but doesn't explain why your fan is running slow. That's a malfunction that should be pinned down. this car is called the Tangerine nightmare for a reason. also the fan mod is litterally just a better fan blade that's 2 inches larger. as for why it runs at 2 different speeds its ti do with my grounding I'm fairly sure. ac runs at power speeds but if I ground the wires directly for the fan switch on the motor it spins faster....sometimes it's not a dual speed fan since I have a dual speed fan on my 84 car and the dual speed also has a much larger fan hub and a giant ballast resister on it cartercarbaficionado JUN 10, 06:18 PM quote Originally posted by Yellow-88: This is a fascinating thread. Hoses blowing of the engine! Boiling over! Your thinking it's the fam? Problem solving is a process. I'd probably start here. Is coolant circulating? Is the radiator getting hot? If so is it hotter going in then coming out? Chasing one's tail just makes one dizzy. I wonder sometimes if you can read. my gauge pegs at that point and this is the Celsius gauge I've Said verified low. when it pegs the engine is over 285 Fahrenheit which is more than most radiator hoses can handle they will either decide to explode or the clamps blow off since one of my cooling pipes doesn't have the biggest barb in the world for the hose size. I have coolant flow and WHEN THE FAN MOVES AIR PROPERLY IT STAYS COOL. but it has to be on constantly or moving signifying that maybe my engine just runs a little warm for some reason or that my coolant is flowing too fast to have enough time to cool off normally needing tge extra help. I know how a cooling system works and started with the basic checks before ever touching this site since clearly I had a weird issue where my system worked correct but didn't cool still. that ended up with me replacing a water pump,headgaskets and every hose on advice several months ago. clearly that didn't work either and intact didn't even change the issue at all Yellow-88 JUN 11, 09:54 AM Yes Carter, I can read. I read the entire thread, a few times. I'm actually beginning to think you post this stuff as "entertainment". It actually is pretty entertaining if one doesn't take it seriously. Having said that, thank you. Send me more. cartercarbaficionado JUN 11, 06:59 PM as per usual with the Tangerine it fixed itself at random and will likely have this issue come back in force soon. I'm gonna try to gather a bunch of parts to see if maybe there's just some combination of stuff going on. I'm definitely going to be making that air dam since I was told in the last thread about overheating I made that it was imperative to have no matter what and now I'm being told different. regardless that is being made and I'm gonna try to seal the fan to the radiator a bit better and replace the fan and it's spliced wires to hopefully drop the resistance a bit to let it spin up better but I'm not holding my breath. the big item is going to be replacing the fan switch with a low temp one and seeing if I can get the fan to actually function on its own to them do a chemical flush of the system to really try and descale everything since it likes having water more than real coolant armos JUN 11, 09:35 PM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: it's not a dual speed fan since I have a dual speed fan on my 84 car and the dual speed also has a much larger fan hub and a giant ballast resister on it quote as for why it runs at 2 different speeds its ti do with my grounding I'm fairly sure. ac runs at power speeds but if I ground the wires directly for the fan switch on the motor it spins faster....sometimes You'll get closer to knowing if you check the voltage potential across the +12V and Ground wires at the fan. If the voltage is low, you'll know there's a power problem. Then you can dig deeper into the cause of the voltage issue. Compare voltage somewhere upstream in that circuit, etc. I'd look at schematics and find what about the +12V and Ground sources are different when using the AC switch versus using the fan switch. Don't trust Haynes/Chilton schematics, use the ones from the factory service manual. If you don't already have that, I think somebody has posted a link to it recently. quote this car is called the Tangerine nightmare for a reason. also the fan mod is litterally just a better fan blade that's 2 inches larger. A more powerful fan that will draw more current from a fan circuit that already appears to be malfunctioning. It will still run slow if you don't resolve why that's happening. If you're feeling overwhelmed by all the problems with the car, then I suggest picking a specific problem that you can measure and troubleshoot down to a cause. Then on to the next one. You need to unravel the decades of non-fixes and workarounds that have probably put the car into this condition. It happens all the time with used cars, until somebody takes it seriously enough to restore it (mechanically/electrically, I don't mean making it a show car). Personally I wouldn't drive it until it can reliably keep itself cool at all times. cartercarbaficionado JUN 11, 10:53 PM quote Originally posted by armos: A more powerful fan that will draw more current from a fan circuit that already appears to be malfunctioning. It will still run slow if you don't resolve why that's happening. If you're feeling overwhelmed by all the problems with the car, then I suggest picking a specific problem that you can measure and troubleshoot down to a cause. Then on to the next one. You need to unravel the decades of non-fixes and workarounds that have probably put the car into this condition. It happens all the time with used cars, until somebody takes it seriously enough to restore it (mechanically/electrically, I don't mean making it a show car). Personally I wouldn't drive it until it can reliably keep itself cool at all times. it can keep itself cool as long as it's moving. as for the fan mod it's litterally just a bigger fan blade in the stock shroud and motor to try to make more static pressure to draw through the rad easier. yeah that's been a real issue is honestly lack of time since this is my buddies only car atm (I drive it more than he does hence why I'm fixing it since I bought the darn thing) it can't be ripped apart for a month to really start finding issues and resolving them like I did to my blazer and 93 accord the cooling system is a very large improvement from what it used to be before I got a week to just spend cleaning and checking things. it used to be so bad that it would overheat all the time constantly and blow hoses left and right before it finally decided to just have a complete melt down and stopped being able to start for months and months which was annoying and we never did quite figure out why other than a new distributor solved it somehow Yellow-88 JUN 11, 11:09 PM [QUOTE]Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: as per usual with the Tangerine it fixed itself at random and will likely have this issue come back in force soon. That's what I mean about entertainment. More fun than actual problem solving. cartercarbaficionado JUN 12, 01:54 AM quote Originally posted by Yellow-88: [QUOTE]Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: as per usual with the Tangerine it fixed itself at random and will likely have this issue come back in force soon. That's what I mean about entertainment. More fun than actual problem solving. ok you go get a vehicle from a Californian desert that was put together 15 years ago by someone who didn't know what they were doing and try fixing any issues and let me know how it goes. sometimes stuff works and then it doesn't which makes it all the more irrating to actually fix. especially when half the time I'm told to just replace this or that or "it's not overheating unless it Boils over" which is extremely unhelpful. intermittent issues are just the best Yellow-88 JUN 12, 10:49 AM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: ok you go get a vehicle from a Californian desert that was put together 15 years ago by someone who didn't know what they were doing and try fixing any issues and let me know how it goes. sometimes stuff works and then it doesn't which makes it all the more irrating to actually fix. especially when half the time I'm told to just replace this or that or "it's not overheating unless it Boils over" which is extremely unhelpful. intermittent issues are just the best Yes. I understand and easily relate to that. I started my car life in the early seventies. British sports cars were rather simple but they can get pretty screwed up by people who "don't know what they are doing". Foreign mechanics where rare and expensive so screwed up cars often got abandoned and could be had wicked cheep. I learned early that problem solving is a precise process. Intermediates are no different, just a bit more frustrating. I moved on to affordable mid engines in the nineties. Let's see .... Maserati, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Toyota ...... Pontiac. Hmmm.... Let's use your heating problem as an example. Does it over heat? yes. Does the coolant start circulating at operating temp? We don't know. If it does, does the radiator get hot? We don't know. if so is the coolant hotter at the inlet than the outlet? We don't know. A accurate thermometer is essential. Do you see where I'm going with this. With any "no" answers we look at the components that make up the system. But don't just start changing stuff especially if it's intermittent. With a verified "yes" to all those questions and the temp is still to high, we start a knew diagnostic. Why is it running hot? And that's not back to the beginning. Detroit must design cooling systems to work in the most extreme conditions. Your cooling problem is not the auxiliary fan.