Is my E36 overheating? Help! :(

Thread in 'Technical Questions' started by griffo20022, Jun 1, 2008.

  1. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    Hey guys, well I know I posted about my heaters blowing cold n stuff, but tonight while I was driving (Normally) I noticed the needle started creeping up slowly from half way upto the 3 quarter mark on the gauge! Is this bad?

    01062008027.

    Thats the furthest point it went when I had just pulled onto my drive. So heres the story....

    I bought the car a couple of weeks ago and it has always flashed up "Check Coolant Level" even though there has been sufficient coolant in the rad. The other day I also noticed it had now stopped blowing hot air with the heaters on full, also it's losing approx half of the expansion tanks worth of coolant about every 150ish miles, although there is no signs of coolant around the engine or on the floor etc.

    Tonight driving to Cannock about 12 miles from me as I was nearly at my destination I noticed the temp gauge was very slowly creeping upto the 3 quarter mark, but never fully reached it. Left the car off for about 2 hours and then afterwards drove home.

    On the way home it crept up, slowly again to as far as the picture shown.

    Theres no water in the oil and no oil in the water, it doesnt seem to white smoke at all either? Has anybody else experienced something similar and if so did you manage to resolve it? My worst thought is possibly headgasket? But like I say there is no contaminated fluids. So I also thought if it could possibly be a f*cked thermostat or water pump?

    Any advice would really be appreciated peeps, thankyou :)
     
  2. dtmpower

    dtmpower Active Member

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    head gasket ?

    also my e36 did a similar thing - found out that I had an air lock - given the unusual expansion tank/rad configuration I had an air lock.
     
  3. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    That was another thought I had, how the frick do you bleed these mofos lol? I seriously need to invest in a gaynes manual!
     
  4. dtmpower

    dtmpower Active Member

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    Mine was overheating following a coolant change

    I broke down on the motorway - local garage chap brought 25 litres of water - we must of put about an extra 5 more than I thought was full.

    He had the heating on full hot

    Took off the expansion cap and also slackened the rad plastic bleed screw (be careful mine was starting to perish)

    And filled up the tank and revved the engine - let it settle for 5 mins and repeat until the tank didn't go down.
     
  5. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    Is the bleed screw the one to the left of the rad cap with the cross in it?? Is that the only place he undone to bleed from? I might give that a try tomorrow seems to be an easy enough test. The car had been sitting since december since I bought the car and started driving it, if that were to make any difference?

    Ta' bud, I really appreciate that!
     
  6. ob1

    ob1 Member

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    Yes,thats the only bleed screw,when water comes out there you've no more air in the system,they're a bitch though. you might be as well off change the water pump,notoriously weak in them,be better than doin a head gasket>
     
  7. Cyruz

    Cyruz Sell Out

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    See post on TD
     
  8. Dele-Himself

    Dele-Himself Active Member

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    my friend had a similar problem on his E36 coupe, just needed a good bleed
     
  9. turbomalv

    turbomalv Member

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    right what engine is it for a start. on some of the six cylinder and 4 cylinder the water pumps have plastic impellers which are shit and can break off to check this either take it out and check or with the system beed you should see a steady flow of water trickling out of the top area of the expansion tank just as you look down after taking the expansion bottle off. if you don't have this trickle and it gets faster as you rev it up. you either have a flow problem or possibly an air lock more likely an air lock if occasionally it does trickle or fire water out. the best way i find and the way most of ujs use at work( bmw main dealer) is to jack the front of the engine up as high as possible ( a steep hill will do) open all bleed screws usually 2 one on top outlet pipe to rad from thermostat and one on expansion tank top. put heaters on full top up and run engine keep topping up till all air bubbles stop coming out of bleed screw holes and once all air is out do the nipples back up. thay can still sometimes always be a bitch to get rid of air blocks. but that is one of the best ways if you don''t have a fully auto pressure type collant bleeder and filler!! if you are fully happy all air is out of system and it still over heats it could either be thermostat( take it out to eliminate) or headgasket!!!!! check your collant system is good. rad in good condition the expansion tanks are prone to exploding and can leak( i know you say you see no water leaks so doubt it could be this but worth a check) hope this helps
     
  10. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    Sorry yer, the engines an M50B25, a 1994 E36 325I

    well I had a go today and I hope I havent buggered the thing up!

    Followed the bleeding procedure as follows until there were no signs of air coming from the bleed tap. Great!

    I tried the heaters and apart from when the blower direction is set to head on (which blows cold constantly doesnt it??) The heat did adjust although it took say a minute or so to fully adjust to the new temperature.

    So I took it out for a drive, trying the temp controls as I went along, again though the temperature gauge started going up, I got her back home, pulled up on the drive and popped the bonnet. shot back to the interior and noticed the red light had just come on! I switched the car off immediately.

    Now this is where I hope I havent made any stupid moves! I went back round to the front and undid the bleed screw a bit and pressure started to release, then the top of the bleed screw snapped! The pressure was releasing pretty damn quickly, it took about 10mins for it to fully settle down (to the point I could undo the coolant cap) my question is will doing this have caused the engine to cool down too quickly and possibly warp the head? I really really hope not! Luckily I managed to undo the remains of the bleed screw so I can just get another one in there now. So heres a quick summary of the situation.

    *Car was bled until no bubbles were appearing from the bleed screw
    *Heater controls worked adjusting from hot to cool to back again
    *There is no signs of water in oil, nor is there oil in water
    *There is signs of dried up coolant around the thermostat housing (the white like frosty/crusty bits)
    *The temp gauge has managed to get as high as activating the light (only for a matter of seconds though)

    I did notice during the bleeding procedure the bottom hose on the drivers side of the rad was pretty much always cool, and the top hose on the passenger side was alot warmer.

    Does this still seem like a pump and thermostat jobby? If so I don't mind, in fact i'll start tonight if it's the case!
     
  11. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    Right well i've decided to just stuff p*ssy footing about, I didn't win some springs n shocks on ebay so now the money will go towards changing my thermostat and water pump!

    I managed to get my thermostat housing and thermostat out and I had to prise the thermostat out with a hammer and screwdriver! So i'm assuming it's a very old thermostat if not original??

    02062008031.
    My thermostat, seemed to look like the valve was very slightly bent? Don't know if thats normal?

    Also heres a piccy of my coolant that came out from the hoses going into and out from the housing, is this a normal colour for just old coolant? Or does it look contaminated with oil or anything to you guys?

    02062008028.
     
  12. turbomalv

    turbomalv Member

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    thats just rusty old coolant. from what you described in your last post you still have an air lock in the system but he air lock could be created from gases escaping into the collant system from (headgasket) did you have the front end of car jacked up when doing the bleeding procedure. try it again with the thermostat out(it won't harm it with no thermostat) are you get the trickle from the top of the expansion tank. all of the time after it was bleed or was it int trickling. if top pipe was hot and bottom cold to touch you have no water in the bottom pipe. another tip is to take the top pipe off and fill with coolant till over flows. this fills the rad up and can eliminate an air lock. but still have the car jacked up high at front.
     
  13. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    Thanks for the info dude!

    Well I got my new parts today, Thermostat, housing, water pump, new bleed screw and coolant. Managed to do the job, pretty straight forward, I bled the system, on idle it did trickle slightly and when you revved the car it pi*sed out from that hole which gave me an indication it was all good? Heaters were blowing hot when set to hot too.

    I took it out for a drive, done about 30miles in total, first half driving down the motor way and second half along A-roads stop/starting the heaters adjusted from hot to cold and vice versa as they should and the needle moved upto the half way mark and didn't budge beyond that throughout the whole journey regardless of situation :)

    Gonna check the coolant level a little later and first thing in the morning before I use it for work, and see how it goes :) I think (AND HOPE!) I've cured it :D Then I can move on to doing some good stuff!
     
  14. Silverfang

    Silverfang F**knuggets

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    If it does go past half way, the only thing left is the viscuous coupling on the fan, easy to check though, get a rolled up newspaper and see if you can stop it while it's idling. if it does, coupling's on it's last legs, if not, it's all good! :D
     
  15. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    Yer I tried with a thick peice of cardboard lol! I could slow it down but not fully stop it, so I spose it's kinda half n half

    I just hope it's all good for the time being :) as long as it's not headgasket failure I don't care. Bet it must be a right bummer changing HG on one of these :S
     
  16. oli

    oli -nightspirit-

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    yay hope you got it sorted and I'll bookmark this for future reference.

    now get some rims haha
     
  17. dtmpower

    dtmpower Active Member

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    :thumbs: well done griffo - that 6 is not the easiest thing to work on
     
  18. griffo20022

    griffo20022 Active Member

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    I need lowerage first dude! Should be getting some lil' pimpy bits this weekend for it lol!

    Think the wannabe alpinas are gonna have to stay until after Australia!

    Ta' DTMPower, no it's not the easiest thing to work on when the only reference you have is my level of common sense:wack:
     
  19. bigbob

    bigbob New Member

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    i had the same thing on mine , changed the thermostat etc, tunned out the water pump impeller fell apart and it only cost £20 to sort:D
     
  20. Jeek™

    Jeek™ Active Member

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    I had the same thing those 325 are a pig to bleed!

    Also you can reset the onboard comp check here

    E36 OBC tricks
     

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