Overheating

when the engine is hot,put your hand on the rad and make sure its hot/warm all over.however on what you have said so far i would be looking at a cracked head.quite often a cylinder head crack "opens"when its under load/pressure and closes when it cools.ps i would love to be proved wrong for your sake.

johncramanderson said:

Well changed the water pump and checked the Radiator all seems well but still overheats under load will idle all dy no problems.
Noticed that the drive belt tensioner bracket is cracked and not holding tension. How do I change the bracket the damper is ok its just the aluminium bracket that the damper bolts to.
Help?????
Thanks

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You still need to check that the thermostat is opening correctly, a few people on here have been caught out with sticky thermostats.
Check that the rad is hot at the bottom as well as at the top.

Will do that next weekend.
Have you seen my new problem regarding the auxiliary belt tension bracket? Pic attached I am asking for help in replacement of the bracket in a different thread.
Lifes a bitch obviously the seller of this vehicle has tried to sort out the problem before judging by the work that has been done on the vehicle. It looks like the head has been done at some point. I thought that a pressure test would prove beyond doubt whether the head was cracked?

i there just take the front part of with a alenkey or stilsons and the braket will slid of esy job to do my car was like that overheating ok on tickover but when you drove it overheated and it was a crack in the water port .thes cars ar none for them to hoverheat and crack the head i got a seconand recondishend one hop this helps you

johncramanderson said:

Will do that next weekend.
Have you seen my new problem regarding the auxiliary belt tension bracket? Pic attached I am asking for help in replacement of the bracket in a different thread.
Lifes a bitch obviously the seller of this vehicle has tried to sort out the problem before judging by the work that has been done on the vehicle. It looks like the head has been done at some point. I thought that a pressure test would prove beyond doubt whether the head was cracked?

Click to expand...

Unfortunately a pressure test unless it is done at high temperature will not prove beyond doubt whether the head is cracked or not

Isn't it obvious that the belt will slip when under load due to the cracked tensioner thus resulting in lack of revs for the fan and water pump. Which I would guess leads to overheating problem.

Johnmowcrop Thanks for the suggestion. The tensioner was working was just fractured. I broke it totally when investigating. The drive belt when vehicle overheated was at a good tension (couldnt turn beyond 1/4turn)

Wish it was a s simple as this.
I am going to try a replacement viscious fan as I could stop the fan with a rolled up newspaper.
John

the viscous fan is only there to cool the engine at idle speed, NOT at motorway speeds,save your money and get it tested with a co2 sniffer.

Guys I think it is sorted now I have had all of the system cleaned out and back flushed and whilst the radiator was off I cleaned a load of gunge out of it back flushed that too. When i filled her up with water there was a lot of air bubbles for a time. After about 1hr idle and intermittent revs of 2500 I filled her up again and went for a drive only to see her hit the red again just as i was going around a roundabout as I did so I heard the water bubble and then the temp guage went down to around 12 o clock. I went on a run down the motorway for around 25 miles and returned home no problems. When engine cooled I removed the filler cap and put in around 1 pint of water. i have used the car for about a further 20 miles and checked no topping up required and the temp guage sits at around 12 o clock. Fingers crossed it has been a multitude of things Thermostat not opening properly, Gunge in the radiator and a big air lock.
Only problem now is it only has water in and i obviously need anti freeze.Dont want to cause another air lock so thought about just removing the expansion tank and filling it with neat anti freeze. Any way fingers crossed and thanks for your help.
John