"PartyPooper2012" (PartyPooper2012)
03/08/2019 at 08:20 • Filed to: None
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"PartyPooper2012" (PartyPooper2012)
03/08/2019 at 08:20 • Filed to: None | 0
| 8 |
My sister called this morning saying her car is overheating. Told her to stop.... drop and roll or just pop into convenience store and get some coolant.
She then started adding it to reservoir as I was afraid radiator was still too hot. Told her to turn heat on to max in car and she asked why...
For ages I have been doing just that when bleeding air from cooling system and today I was trying to find out why.
Having heat on in the car has nothing to do with thermostat. Thermostat is typically in the closed position until it is warmed up by hot coolant . Opens and allows coolant to flow to radiator for more cooling. What’s it got to do with heating running inside car? Anyone?
If heating is on, coolant is allowed to flow to heater core. only thing I can see is making sure there is no air in heater core. Is that it?
BrianGriffin thinks “reliable” is just a state of mind
> PartyPooper2012
03/08/2019 at 08:28 |
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Yes. Just like a home radiator system, there can’t be any air anywhere in the lines. If there’s an air bubble in the heater core, it could travel.
nerd_racing
> PartyPooper2012
03/08/2019 at 09:03 |
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Some cars have a re circulation valve that doesn’t allow coolant flow into the heater core unless heat is on. Full blast puts full flow thru the valve. My 95 B3000 had that system. I’m pretty sure it was shot because I never had heat in that p o s.
gogmorgo - rowing gears in a Grand Cherokee
> PartyPooper2012
03/08/2019 at 10:09 |
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Yeah, many cars have a valve controlling coolant flow through the heater core. Some do it to control temperature; more flow = more temperature. Others, like the XJ Cherokee, control heater temperature by blending hot and cold air so the coolant valve is irrelevant but there anyhow. So in those cases cranking the heat will allow the heater core to fill if it was drained.
There are disadvantages to that valve , however. In climates where the heater doesn’t get much use, and especially where topping up with antifreeze isn’t as common, junk tends to accumulate inside the heater core, and either corrode it, or plug it solid, so the heater either leaks coolant into the vehicle interior or doesn’t work when you try to use it. So not all vehicles have them.
Alternatively, when you turn on the heat and it actually gets hot, you know you have enough coolant for it to be flowing through the heater core.
Urambo Tauro
> PartyPooper2012
03/08/2019 at 10:17 |
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Yeah, it’s all about whether the car has a heater core valve. Turning the HVAC system to full hot is listed as standard procedure on non-vehicle-specific how-to directions because it’s easier to just tell everybody to turn it to full hot than it is to explain how to determine if a car has that valve or not.
Neither of my vehicles have that valve, so it doesn’t matter what I have the HVAC set to.
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PartyPooper2012
> Urambo Tauro
03/08/2019 at 11:46 |
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Thank you kindly. Appreciate the confirmation
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PartyPooper2012
> gogmorgo - rowing gears in a Grand Cherokee
03/08/2019 at 11:53 |
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Thanks. Makes sense.
I may have misunderstood my dad when he was telling me why heat needed to be on - I heard him as “ it opens thermostat” ... but I was young and his English was terrible so I know it was wrong.
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gogmorgo - rowing gears in a Grand Cherokee
> PartyPooper2012
03/09/2019 at 00:09 |
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He could also simply have been wrong. I’ve heard experienced professional mechanics tell me shit about my vehicles that I know to be straight up wrong. Although in many cases it’s less about the “what” you should do so much as it is the “why”.
I’ve also heard professional welders suggest that if you accidentally expose your unprotected eyes to the arc (effectively sunburning your retinas) you should squish potatoes and hold them in your eyes to heal them. The why is because the starchy juice is soothing and that’s about it, but the welder got mad at me for calling him out after he said the potatoes suck the UV light back out of your retinas.
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PartyPooper2012
> gogmorgo - rowing gears in a Grand Cherokee
03/18/2019 at 07:05 |
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HAHAHA. I needed some potatoes when same dad told me to stand back a bit from the welding. I stood back across the street to be safe.... needless to say... my eyes were so scratchy the next few days as I burned the living lights out of my corneas.
Suggested remedies included tea bags on my eyes.
Potatoes and Tea will surely suck the UV light out.