cooling woes... overheated the TW

[Hondasucks]

So last weekend I went to visit my uncle in Rifle, CO (For those who don't know where that is, it's right offa I-70 about 90 miles from the CO/UT border) took the back way down from Laramie, cool drive, 25 miles or so on a 2 lane dirt road... anyhoo we discovered while we were down there that he was going to Denver about 9 the following morning, and that my cousin that I hadn't seen since 88 or so was going to be there, so we decided to go back I-70 to Denver, see my cousin, adn then go back up I-25 to Laramie. Well it was kinda hot out and so we had the A/C going. All was fine until we were coming up Vail Pass (10,500ft) and I noticed that the car was making a rattling noise, like it was pinging, at first I thought it must be the altitude, but then I remembered that it's less likely to knock as altitude rises, that's when I happened to look over at the temp gauge.. Pegged into the red. We turned the heater on (Jess was driving) and managed to drop the temp back down, but when we noticed it we had just crested the hill and started heading back down the other side. When we started climbing the next hill, that leads to the Eisenhower tunnel, it got a little hot but not into the red, just about 3/4 of the way up the gauge, where it normally sits at half or a little below half. Crested the hill as we went through the tunnel, and basically coasted the rest of the way down into Denver. Right when we leveled out it started getting hot, so I turned the heater back on. No hot air. I figured we must have dumped a bunch of steam out and were just low on water, so I grabbed my jug of antifreeze out of the back and poured some in and then we caught up to my uncle and it pegged again. I pulled off to the side of I-70 and let it cool off a bit (and I hardwired the fan so it would run all the time) and then I followed my uncle off the freeway to a gas station, since he noticed that as I was adding water it was dumping out the bottom somewhere. So we got to the gas station, got gouged $8.99 for a bottle of antifreeze, and I poured in some water to try and find the leak. Appeared to be coming from the water pump but I couldn't see it coming from any of the hoses or from the weep hole, so I guessed that it must be the gasket. My uncle ran down the street to AutoZone and grabbed me 3 bottles of Bar's Leaks, dumped two in and the leak slowed ot a drip, drove to where we were going, and it did just fine. Right before we left, I dumped the other bottle of bar's leaks in and topped off the radiator, and headed north towards Cheyenne. Stopped in Cheyenne and topped off the water and the fuel tank, and headed to Laramie. Right when I got to my driveway it started dumpign coolant everywhere again.

 

Flash forward to today: Went to Advance Auto and got a NEW water pump with a lifetime warranty, upper and lower radiator hose, and both belts. They didnt' have the lower hose in stock, so I went over to Checker and they had the hose, plus I picked up some radiator flush and a flush-n-fill kit. Managed to get the new water pump on and both hoses. tomorrow I'm going to finish putting it back together (Could have gotten it tonight but the mosquitos were eating me alive and it was getting dark) adn flush the cooling system, and hook the heater core back up the right way (It's hooked up backwards right now) and I'll prolly do an oil change too. I don't think I cracked the head cuz I'm not getting water out the tailpipe or anything...

 

Anyone know of a good electric fan I could put in as a second fan? Would have to be somewhat of a thin fan.... I'd hook the second one up so it ran all the time, not just when hot like the other fan. YEs I know this car should have an engine driven fan, someone had gotten lazy and cut the shroud to get the fan out, so I just took it off altogether adn ended up putting it on an XT I had that had coolign problems. Should I use an electrif fan, or should I find a good engine driven fan???

[Flowmastered87GL]

Sad to hear it overheated on you, I hope that the engine faired ok. Since the gaskets are pretty new lets hope so.

 

Dont get me wrong, I love turbos, but its stuff like that that kept happening to my silver 86 turbowagon that made me not really want an EA82T anymore

[[HTi]Johnson]

you should have 2 fans, unless your AC isn't stock. I always thought all AC subarus had two electric fans...I know my EA82t did. as far as I knew, it never had an engine driven fan. Oh yeah, the AC fan turns on with the AC system.

[stngllhm]

you should have 2 fans, unless your AC isn't stock. I always thought all AC subarus had two electric fans...I know my EA82t did. as far as I knew, it never had an engine driven fan. Oh yeah, the AC fan turns on with the AC system.

 

no if you have stock ac you will have one electric and one run off the water pump. also on a side note just turn on the heater won't always work cause on a subaru the ac pump is engage with the heater on. so when ever i'm having trouble with over heating i will unhook the electic lines goning to the pump so i can run the heater without engaging the ac pump.

 

as far as electic to engine driven fans i have had better luck with the engine driven ones and if you need one i'm pretty sure i got one lying around that is yours if you want it

[Sweet82]

I just purchased a second fan from a JY for the buggy.

I didn't have A/C so I got an A/C fan off another Subie.

 

It's real flat and fits into the pre-drilled holes in the radiator.

Works like a charm!

 

Good luck,

Glenn

82 SubaruHummer--dual fans.

01 Forester--dual fans.

[Caboobaroo]

Andrew, do a quick search because another board member recently got a second electric fan for his EA82 wagon. I believe that member was Tin Solider and he even included a part number from Napa...