Bit confused folks

[Tokyo drift]

Hi there all!

Coming to the end of jobs to do on my Surf, thank god but just one thing is niggling at me.

Engine comes up to temp (on gauge that is, half way), top of rad is from I read is meant to be toasting hot, as are heater hoses etc, heater working nicely too now but rad bottom hose is luke warm, so is rad until top tank..

Header bottle is filling up about 25 mm when up to temp and then returning to normal on cool down.

New rad cap, stat, rubber hoses, everything flushed through plenty times and bled via a water bottle stuffed in the stat housing/filler neck.

Looked through the search database but people with same symptom were having overheating issues, i'm not. Or is this just I have a very effective cooling system

P.s viscous fan has been overhauled and if anything needs more oil.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

[Bazcam]

What symptons?

Sounds like its all working as it should be.

[Tokyo drift]

Reports of exceptionally cool rads (except top tank of rad) but also of overheating or expansion tanks over flowing.

Now I know by the laws of thermo dynamics heat rises, so the top of the rad will always be hotter but my rad is roasting at the top tank then luke warm the rest of the way down..

It may be my rad is working well but it should be fairly warm at the bottom too. Just don't want to find there's an underlying problem that destroys all the hard work up to now.

Thanks again in advance!

[BUSHWHACKER]

Everything is normal.

I'm guessing you have a 2.4? as there's no details under your username.

[Tokyo drift]

Yes dreaded 2.4, well I say dreaded because mines had clearly been neglected all it's life, the body work etc is like new though

It's a relief to know that this is normal, was just most cars I have worked on the rad grudualy gets cooler as you go down the rad and is still warm at the bottom..

I think the biggest problems that a lot of these surfs suffer from is lack of maintanence, so when you do go to say change the coolant, the system is well and truly crusted up.

Looking forward to actually driving it

Thanks for the words if re assurance, I will update my user name details!

[NiftyNev]

Looking forward to actually driving it

So you have not driven it yet? The engines in these do not get that hot when just standing. The real test will come when you drive it.The radiator should then be much hotter at the bottom. As it stands now, even if the radiator was half blocked it would be enough, without the engine under load. That's when you will find out for sure if it's working as it should.

Nev

[Tokyo drift]

Thanks for the help all!

Took it to Edinburgh and back, around 85 ish miles. radiator still almost cold from right inder the top tank. Heater good ish and the coolant is expanding slightly into the header tank then returning to normal after cool down.

Mind there was alot of crud in the system so maybe both the heater matrix and rad are lined with the stuff..

The Viscous fan takse a while to stop after shut down, so either i need to add more oil or the is too cold to effect the bi metalic strip on the fan..

One more thing to ask, when removing passenger front drive shaft to replace outer boot, it took an hour half of fiddling to get it past the inner diff flange (removed 2 studs of flange which helped and anti roll bar tie down rod/ball joint). Read about lining up wish bone but this didnt help. I still have the original electrically ride adjustable shocks..

Thanks all.