bilbo
Full Access Member
I was parked today idling while waiting for someone and saw the temp gauge at about 3/4 scale. Normally it’s around 1/4. This was after an hour or so driving through town so stop & go. Truck is a 1994 F250 7.3 IDI NA. I shut the truck down and checked it over, it didn’t feel or seem hotter than normal. The overheat light did not come on. Outside temp was about 45F; it’s seen warmer temps before without this issue.
Later on after letting it cool down I did some purposeful test driving and it behaved the same, so something has changed. I had been noticing every once in a while the gauge would drop out, so I bought a new sensor but hadn’t put it in yet. I’m going to start with that tomorrow. Any other ideas what this could be? Is it possible the water pump impeller is rotted away?
Maybe fab clutch? But it did hold the higher temp going down the highway too. Wouldn’t I see it go down on the highway if it was the fan clutch?
I did notice the top of the radiator is hot but it gets cool in the finned area. Even when the top was too hot to hold my hand on, a few inches below it was cool to the touch. Is that normal?
Is the t-stat possibly bad? Should I replace that when I do the temp sensor since I’ll lose the coolant up there anyway? Any considerations or specific bleeding I need to do after I put it back together?
Later on after letting it cool down I did some purposeful test driving and it behaved the same, so something has changed. I had been noticing every once in a while the gauge would drop out, so I bought a new sensor but hadn’t put it in yet. I’m going to start with that tomorrow. Any other ideas what this could be? Is it possible the water pump impeller is rotted away?
Maybe fab clutch? But it did hold the higher temp going down the highway too. Wouldn’t I see it go down on the highway if it was the fan clutch?
I did notice the top of the radiator is hot but it gets cool in the finned area. Even when the top was too hot to hold my hand on, a few inches below it was cool to the touch. Is that normal?
Is the t-stat possibly bad? Should I replace that when I do the temp sensor since I’ll lose the coolant up there anyway? Any considerations or specific bleeding I need to do after I put it back together?