> As you may remember, I live in Phoenix AZ, current temp is 1080 F at
Wow, that means all the solder melted out of your electrical connections !
Not to mention your gas tank exploding !
(Hint : leave out the degree symbol next time. It gets changed by the list
server.)
> Yes, I know the argument about not using a thermostat making the
> water flow through the radiator too quickly. However, a colleague
> argued that is exactly what a high volume water pump would do. Your
> thoughts?
Making the water flow too quickly is hooey, IMO. But your colleague is
exactly right, if making the water flow too fast is a problem, then a high
volume water pump would cause the same problem.
On some cars, the radiator is a significant restriction to water flow.
Without the thermostat to also serve as a restrictor, the pressure drop
across the radiator can exceed the rating of the cap under some
circumstances. When this happens, water will flow out of the cap, leaving
the system low on water and potentially doing things like causing the lower
radiator hose(s) to collapse (which impedes flow, raises the pressure
differential and generally makes things ever worse than they were before).
So the system overheats due to lack of water (and potentially lack of flow
if the hoses collapse).
> I am thinking about punching out the thermostat part of the old 1800
> thermostat & only installing the outer ring to slow the flow a
> little. Your thoughts?
Since your problem doesn't seem to match the symptoms I've described above,
I don't think this will help in your case.
> Any other suggestions before a new radiator or water pump?
I didn't see anything about making sure the engine is running right. Lean
mixture (when were your carb jets replaced last ?), late ignition timing
(static, centrifugal, vacuum), late valve timing, even dragging brakes can
cause overheating. Is your cardboard air deflector in place (not blocking
the radiator) ?
When you say you flushed the radiator, was that only with water ? Have you
tried any of the chemical flushes ? (They used to sell a 2-part flush that
I think worked better, but I haven't been able to find it for a long time.)
After all that, my next step would be to remove the radiator, and have a
local shop test it for efficiency. That proved to be the problem with my
car (after eliminating all the other stuff) ... apparently the fins were no
longer in good thermal contact with the tubes. The radiator looked fine,
flowed OK & didn't leak, but it just didn't transfer heat very well. A
replacement Modine core, with no crank hole, did wonders for my problem.
IMO, the high volume pump will mostly help at idle. At higher engine
speeds, my stock pump seems to move plenty of water, since there seems to be
very little difference in water temp between entering and leaving the
radiator. All more water flow can do is lower this differential, and if
there isn't any differential to lower ...
Randall
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