I've just changed the thermostat on my 1993 panda ie, 'cos it was overcooling. Now it runs hotter than i think it should (about 3/4 way round the temp gauge).

I at first thought that the new thermostat was dicky , so chnaged it for another and this does the same thing?

On the second fitting i was careful to get the car level when i refilled it. Do these cars suffer from airlocks?

Any ideas anybody?

Did you flush the circuit?It could be a good idea especially after an high mileage/lot of years without replacing the coolant!

Passion has neither brands nor models!

La passione non ha nè marche nè modelli!
(Quite happy dark met. blue Panda driver!)

Does the electric fan kick in?

No i didn't flush the system - the stuff that came out looked pretty clean. And i did fill it up 'till water came out of the vent on right hand side of radiator ( as the handbook said).

And yes the fan does cut in - again at what seems a high level (3/4 way round the temp scale). THat said, once the car has warmed up and the fan comes on, if you are standing then the fan pretty much stays on. Expansion tank/radiator doesn't need topping up when the car cools down.

I did notice a bleed screw on the heated hose - maybe i should open this and see if anything comes out.

thanks for the input

There are two bleed screws:

one on the opposite end of the radiator to the expansion tank,
the other in the return from the heater.


If you are under cooled you might have missed the first one.
If the heater doesn't work you need to do the second.

You might need to rev the engine up to get sufficient "head" on the water pump to fill the heater core - the bleed is on the return pipe.

Dan

Open both bleed plugs. To fill above the bleed plug on the heater return, rev the engine a bit. Otherwise it will only fill up to the same level as the expansion bottle.

I have a few questions here; When you changed out the thermostat did you test it in hot water to see what temp it opened/closed at?

I have a J reg Fiat Dance. My car overheats whenever I stop for more than a minute or so. The radiator fan does come on, but it comes on perhaps at too high a temperature and it does not stay on for long.
Where can I buy a new thermostat in the London area? Where can I buy a new fan switch? How much are they?
thanks nrb

What is the basis of your "overheats" and "too high a temperature"?
Do you mean the gauge is reading high, or does it boil over??

If it doesn't boil over, you may just have the wrong temperature sensor in the engine block: some people baulk at the price of a "correct" FIAT part, fit a generic pattern part with the wrong characteristics and end up with an oddly reading gauge.

See if you can measure the temperature of the outside of the top of the radiator without burning yourself, or getting mangled by the fan.

According to Haynes the stat should open at 85 deg. C
(top hose suddenly hot) and be fully open at 89deg. C

Fan cuts in 90 to 94 deg. C
Fan cuts out 85 to 89 deg. C

If the fan doesn't stay on long, my first reaction would be that everything is happy...



The Dance is the 903 pushrod engine, AFAIK, which has a sensible arrangement with the thermostat:
it's a module inside a removeable cover (unlike the FIRE where you have to do the whole lump for 15UKP or so - I'd guess the other one should be about half that.)

London is a big place.. there must be a half decent motor factor near you somewhere - even Halfords do the stat for the "FIRE", but I haven't needed one for the other engine... ask??

The thermostat switch is about £15 from Fiat, the thermostat a little more. That way you will get the right part for your car...