It sounds like regardless if the gauge is working or not that your car IS overheating--with the aftermarket senders that have no seperate ground wire (grounded through the threads on the sender) it is very easy for a gauge to fluctuate wildly if you have a lousy ground. One thing that keeps coming to mind is--who did the sleeving? Perhaps one of your sleeves is sinking or is not sealed from the water jacket completly--it might be below the pistons (to where you wouldn't see bubbles in the coolant from combustion but where coolant could be escaping)--preventing the system from holding any pressure--you seem to have gone through everything--I would give that some thought.....

 

Ok, get yourself a seperate WORKING temperature gauge. You can find digital water thermometers at Pet stores for aquariums that will work fine.

See if the car is actually overheating or not via a second guage that is NOT tied into the car in any way.

If it shows steady while the other one is fluctuating, then you need to diagnose the problem with your guage. This sounds like a guage problem more than anything else. That's a negative coefficient resistor I believe, and it sounds like voltage spikes causing your problems. Bad ground or wiring problems.

Regardless, start by getting that tempature monitored for sure and eliminating overheating completely.

 

Thanks for the input guys.

As for actually finding the temperature, I actually did (I dont think you happened to read above) buy a cheap water temp gauge. What I did was stick it right in the open radiator cap (it cannot be threaded into stock location because its one of the cheap ones) and monitored from there. I had 190 solid after idling at operating temp for about 20 minutes, but to me it wasnt a good indication because a lot of times, my gauge would not fluctuate until the cap was put on. What do you suggest I do in this situation?

As for the post above about problems with my sleeves, you may be correct, but Benson did it so I am leaning toward them being OK, but yeah you never know, I just want to make perfectly sure whats wrong/try to find a solution without tearing everything apart.

 

The car doesn't overheat with the cap off?

 

No, it appears that it doesnt...before I was running it with the cap off no problem, as soon as I put it on and drove the car about 100 feet it "overheated"...but I cant say for sure because I havent had a lot of time to test stuff, but it sure as heck appeared that the cap made a difference.


Modified by xxxmikenicexxx at 2:20 AM 7/6/2006

 

Maybe your air bubble is trying to escape and can't when the cap is on. Run the car for a while with the cap off. See if the bubble will work its way out.

 

I already have MULTIPLE times, but I should have the car running again tomorrow so I will def run it for as long as possible to get that out of the equation.

I noticed over a few days that the level drops extremely slowly...almost like there IS a bubble stuck in the engine somewhere that running with the cap off will not get rid of...is this possible?

I also have coolant lines running to my turbo...but they got plenty hot so there is coolant in them. Just thought Id throw that out there in case it has a bearing on anything.

 

This same thing happened to my integra when i changed the water pump. When you filled the coolant did you leave the bleeder open?

 

Yes I did...the same EXACT thing happened to you? Even as in the fluctuation and coolant going down and everything? How did you fix it?

 

I accidentally left the bleeder closed and had to drain all the fluid out, and refill it. Maybe your problem is different, such as a sticky thermostat. I really don't know. If you left the bleeder open you shouldn't have an air bubble. But it is possible.

 

I was just having problems similar to yours and it turned out to be my radiator had deposits in it and it was clogged which wasn't letting the coolant flow properly. So I bought a brand new radiator, installed it and all of my probs. went away. You might want to shine a flashlight in it and see if you can see deposit buildups. Do you know the last time it was replaced? If it is still the one that came with the car, that would be the first thing I'd replace.