Coolant temperature weirdness

[Peter Schulz]

Bernie:

What we seem to be experiencing is NOT the usual failure mode of the 
MFTS..., which is what you describe ( no reading, then up to the 1/3 mark, 
then drop off again or a consistently low reading.

My Indigo wagon, once the car warms up, the temp tends to stay at the 1/3 
mark, whether on the highway or stop and go...of course it will edge upward 
during stop and go, and the fan will come on.

My grey wagon has the same behavior described...low readings on the 
highway, "normal" stop and go.
since this is not the "classic" MFTS failure symptom of the erratic temp 
display, I suspected the Tstat as sticking and not closing fully.

I am going to try to verify this using a borrowed infrared temp gun, 
measuring the temp of the water manifold when its at the "low" point, and 
again at the "normal" operating point.   If the temps DO vary, then the 
MFTS is working properly, and there is a problem elsewhere.

Question for the group should be..are you running the 3 or 4 pin MFTS...

-Peter


At 04:01 PM 3/5/2004, you wrote:
>So, what's your complaint, just that the temp gage reads low?  That's not
>too bad, if it reads consistently low.  The MFTS usually fails in an
>intermittent fashion, gage reading back and forth between zero and some
>actual temp.
>
>Bernie