Keeps overheating unable to find problem

[Wildknife]

I have a 93 festy that when you drive it above 35 miles an hour, the temp will just shoot thou the roof, however the moment I come to a stop, or even let it run in my driveway the temp goes back to a reasonable level (alittle before 1/2 way, the needle is right below the heat icon)
we've:
flushed the rad
Flushed the Rad again
removed the thermostat
replaced the thermostat
removed the AC belt (AC still works when I have the belt on )
it has a brand new water pump.

We were unable to find where(if the festy even has one) a bleeder valve for the coolant system.

I'm almost convinced that the entire coolant system has a large amount of Georgia red clay in it (I live in Atlanta, I believe someone found a way to mess with my coolant system cuz I had to let him go[work], that's besides the point)

any comments on how to make this hot festy me just a warm one?
bleeder valve... how to flush out the entire coolant system (I think I got most of the "stuff" out of it, thou the anti-freezes still retains the color)

HELP I love my lil egg-mo-bill..



-Wildknife

[mattswabb]

Check your lower radiator hose. I've heard that if it is soft/worn it is possible that it could collapse when the pump is sucking the fluid out of the radiator.

matt

[Tim]

Check the radiator as well.

Bent fins, as well as physical damage to it can reduce the flow of air and coolant.

Mine was in a really sad state so I replaced it with a dual core one.



Regards,

Tim

[Roboskittle]

Is it a crappy ass red color that resembles rust??? Mine had this problem and I never could fix it. The motor ran great and it never actually overheated after I pulled the thermostat completely out of it. It never showed that it was overheating any ways but when I would stop and park it the coolant would be boiling over and spill out of the overfill. I replaced the radiator along with both hoses and I even tried to bypass the heater core for a while and it did absolutely nothing. Someone told me that i might have a blown headgasket and that exhaust gas was being introduced into the system. I never did end up fixing it I was like wtf im gonna swap the motor out anyways but then I smacked the car into a brick wall at about 20 mph and that was the end of it. Hope you get it fixed bro. Good Luck.

[Pgh5spd]

If the radiator/hose isn't the problem, go back to the sludge-in-system angle.

You say you flushed the system twice, but does the coolant look good now? If not, keep flushing. These things can accumulate an unholy amount of sludge if the cooling system has been neglected, usually meaning that it's never been flushed in its lifetime. The last one I got was like that.

When I do a flush, I do the drain and fill routine a few times, and then drive for a day and drain it again into a white bucket. It will probably still look like hell. Refill and repeat. In a week you may get to the point of feeling it's worth putting antifreeze in again.

PS - there is one other thing that hasn't been suggested. IF Festiva water pumps have sheetmetal impellers (I don't know - never had one off in 15yrs of running them), I know that it has happened with other cars that have such pumps that the impeller either disintegrates or comes loose from the shaft, resulting in no water circulation. I've never heard of this with a Festiva, but it's worth considering I guess.

John

[Tim]

Instead of using antifreeze to clean out the system, I used water.

Much less mess.


Regards,

Tim

[worfdog]

had a early 50"s jeep that did the same thing.flushed radiator several times and did every thing you did.finally took to a radiator shop.said it was clogged and would be better to replace.i did and never had a problem again.if hoses are not bad as per previous post might be a good idea to have it checked

[Wildknife]

Thanks guys,

I ended up flushing(with a water hose) the radiator by itself then fleshed the engine part (I normality work on A-2 pinsetters, this is the frist time I ever worked on a car..well, its my 1st car=P ) after a while, I had both parts running clear water, and took it around the block a few times to test the thing, then finally I was able to drive home (was at a party 2 hours away from home...)

I'm pretty sure I have at lest most of that muck out of my eggy, but I'm frighten to take it above 55 for prolonged amounts of time. I'm using radiator flush again tomorrow just to make sure.

a year into having the car, I had a water coolant hose burst on me. the water/ coolant was alright.
6 months ago I had a small leak in my radiator fixed it with JB weiled. it fixed the hole but when I was draining the system, I was amazed at what was coming out!
a friend told me that a bug called a mud dubber (like a brown wasp) could have somehow built a nest in my car, but that normally happens to cars that are left sitting and not running. Looking at My festiva, I cant see how anything like what I was seeing (I never seen rust clump up like lil mud balls, popping out of the hose like BBs for a kids rifle) could have gotten into the coolant system.

as for the water pump.. and the blades, when I find a digital camera, I'll take a picture of what pump I took out looked like.. dear god..

Thanks again guys.



-Wildknife

[miami man]

flush

be careful how you flush your system. on my 86 sun bird i back flushed it and i did not know it dislodged some rust in the heater core and it sprung a massive leak.