condor74
Full Access Member
Recently had the transmission rebuilt on my 1990 F250 4x4 with a 7.3 IDI. Have been commuting to work in it about 10 miles each way for 2 weeks. flushed coolant and repaired a few other things that have come up. Well this week for Easter the plan is to Take it out of town towing a small trailer full of 2 dirt bikes, a quad, and a golf cart. The trip is about 150 or so miles and I do have to climb a pass.. Well the truck ran smooth with no issues on flat ground with the cruise set at 55 mph. The minute I started climbing the grade the tempurature started to climb. about 10 miles up the 30 mile long grade temp guage went to hot and check engine light came on. I pulled over and let it cool down. Found a small pin hole in the radiator that only seems leak when radiator has a lot of pressure in it. I dumped a can of stop leak and topped my coolant back off. I started back up the hill and 10 more miles the truck over heats again. Not coming out of pin hole this time. Long story short Stop 3 or 4 times on the way up the hill but once I am on the top and level ground or down hill the truck cools back down to the lower half of normal. Drive the rest of the way down the hill with out insodent. Get on highway 14 and there is some gentle up hills that all of a sudden seemed like mountains because every time the truck aimed upward the temp climbed. Had to stop an additional 4 times. Once again on flat ground the engine stayed cool. Tomarrow I will be calling to see if there is any Radiator shops open that can repair my radiator in 1 day. nice start to my vacation. lol Oh well. There are other funny side stories that went on during this I may share later.