Wondering if someone out there can help me.

My brother's car is having some cooling issues. He was driving it yesterday and it started smoking from the right side of the engine bay. Pulled over and there was coolant all over the top of the rad, the reservoir, and the air box.

There was no coolant in the overflow when I popped the hood today. I added coolant and had him start it up. Ran fine and took forever to get up to temp. The temp guage eventually went up 3/4 of the way and the fan didn't turn on and the lower rad hose never got warm (the upper rad hose was almost too hot to touch).

Is the temp switch for the fan the plug on the t-stat housing? Would a bad t-stat be the cause of the fan not turning on?

The car's a 1997 LX with a SOHC motor in it (forget the engine name, d16y7 maybe?).

Forgot to add, the CEL is on, but I didn't have time to check the codes.

 

you have described the typical symptoms of a t-stat failed in the closed position. replace the t-stat (OEM part# 19301-P08-316) and bleed the system thoroughly

the fan switch is in the t-stat hosuing, but the fan will not come on if the t-stat is not opening (hot coolant will never make its way to the switch). air in the system could also cause the t-stat to not open but in your case it seems the t-stat has failed.

 

Thanks for the reply. I was hoping it would be something simple, when he first got ahold of me and described the symptoms I was thinking headgasket.

 

yeah this sound like a t-sat prob but you should all make sure that the fans will come on by turning on the a/c for a sec to see if the fans are working when cammanded

 

http://techauto.awardspace.com/overheating.html