Festiva not running at normal temp. ideas?

[Justinstees]

93 Ford Festiva not getting up to normal running temp. My temp gauge always reads cold, only moves up a little from cold after driving for a while. Defrost and feet blow hot air but front vents only blow cold. Think i heard that front always only blow cold from somewhere on internet

[Dragonhealer]

Yup, center vents won't blow hot, it's a design feature (flaw?)
We have 4 Festivas and all won't go over 1/4 scale here in southern Arizona, except the one time towing a trailer with a racecar on it, went to 1/2 scale and the check engine light came
on. Was found to have no coolant left due to a ruptured hose....
Tried fitting new temp transmitters with no change. Must be the way the temp gauges fail gradually over time. Anyone else shed light?

[Team Lightning]

My 90L has always ran in the lower part of the scale. Even when it was new it never ran close to the middle of the range unless it was in the upper 90's low 100's in temp.
The AC vents only blow cold and always have since it was new. It's just the way they were built.

[lessersivad]

93 Ford Festiva not getting up to normal running temp. My temp gauge always reads cold, only moves up a little from cold after driving for a while. Defrost and feet blow hot air but front vents only blow cold. Think i heard that front always only blow cold from somewhere on internet

Does it have a tachometer style gauge cluster? If it does, read this;

http://www.fordfestiva.com/forums/showthread.php?25638-Temp-gauge-reading-too-low-(FIXED)

[koRnhead]

Sounds like a normal festiva temp gauge. If it makes heat, then you're good. That's just where it runs.

[tooldude]

I think some brands of thermostats may not regulate the Festy properly. Also, they can lose regulating quality with age. The center vent may be a copy of GM's "fresh air" concept where you can't close off the outside air, but you can heat it when the heat control is turned up, without selecting the heat position. You can't close off outside skunk smells, exhaust, or toxic gas, etc., which can be lethal. An accident on a Houston freeway, for example, involved a truck carrying, I believe it was ammonia, and leaked a toxic cloud so thick you could not see through it for too many minutes, causing further collisions. As it kept spewing gas, not only did some vehicles have to drive through it very slowly, others were immobilized in the cloud. What do you think of that vent now?

[Movin]

I think some brands of thermostats may not regulate the Festy properly. Also, they can lose regulating quality with age. The center vent may be a copy of GM's "fresh air" concept where you can't close off the outside air, but you can heat it when the heat control is turned up, without selecting the heat position. You can't close off outside skunk smells, exhaust, or toxic gas, etc., which can be lethal. An accident on a Houston freeway, for example, involved a truck carrying, I believe it was ammonia, and leaked a toxic cloud so thick you could not see through it for too many minutes, causing further collisions. As it kept spewing gas, not only did some vehicles have to drive through it very slowly, others were immobilized in the cloud. What do you think of that vent now?

I don't like GM's system of doors. The festy is simple and light. You can turn the festy to only inside air and there is no fixed amount of outside air bleeding through unless the field mice built an obstruction . I see all three of mine barely warm up enough to make the heater work too. Towing heavy loads in triple digit heat has never been an issue but it will warm enough to turn the fan on occasionally. I tried lots of thermostat brands on the red one. The first one made the heater work again but I didn't see a difference between brands. I went with the dual mazda type because the quality looks better. Our festies are one step better than a street bike for protection and that could be argued lol !

[crazyrog17]

I would argue that the dual thermostat works too well to maintain a lower temperature. The small thermostat opens before the larger one and keeps the whole system 'cold'. I think a 195 degree single stage would be my choice if I were looking for heat

[sketchman]

Mine have always run "cold" too. Even ones that made good heat inside. Only time they go past 1/2 is when they over-heated and blew up things.

[WmWatt]

OP does not give location or length of time he has had the car. In winter car may not warm up to operating temp if only driven short distances. My '89 runs cold in winter, warm, sometimes very warm, in summer.

[tooldude]

I have always had good heat from the heater and the guage has always run near half scale, though it is not too often it gets as low as even 25F in places I have lived. The engine is rather slow to warm up though. I did start having the exact problems everyone is always talking about with my S-10 pickup, really slow to warm up and temp guage so low I wondered if it was running open loop. I replaced the thermostat and now it warms up quickly and runs in the right range like it should. I think that shows how a t-stat should be able to control that problem. I'm wondering if Festys have too much radiator for the northern winters.

[nitrofarm]

Corrugated plastic zip tied in front of 75% of the radiator with the original thermostat. Warm everyday no matter how cold it is outside. My heater core is my radiator :thumbs_up: