Car: Fiat Punto Mk1 1999 1242cc 8valve.
I just wanted to pass on a tip to help people when they cannot get an air lock out when doing work on any of the coolant system on the Punto.
Last week I changed the heater rad (matrix) on my car and put all the coolant pipes back on and opened up the bleed screw on the radiator and the bleed screw on the heater 'Hot' coolant pipe in the engine compartment.
Started filling it up with antifreeze and water mixture put the inside heater control fully to Hot and switched the heater blower to full on and set the control to 'feet/interior heater' and started the engine. After a while I was having huge problems whereas the temperature gauge was shooting up to hot and the top hose was not getting hot (but the engine was!) and the fan didn't cut in. I turned off the engine and after a while the water went down in the expansion tank so I filled it up with some more coolant.
After a while i started up the engine again and the temperature gauge was staying one notch under the half way mark as normal and the fan was coming on and off but I had a problem that the interior heater was blowing out cold air even though the heater control was full on hot. I had the bleed valves open and was pressing hoses trying to expel air and still could not get the heater hot at all. it went on like this for ages and i was starting to think that maybe it being a new heater radiator that it might have a manufacturing fault and that it was blocked inside or that I left some kind of 'rubber bung' that i didn't take out and I would have to end up taking out all the dash again and sending the heater rad back!
anyway it went on like this for ages still blowing out cold air and then I had an Idea. I undid the jubilee clip on the heater return pipe in the engine compartment whilst the engine was still running/idling and gently pulled off the pipe and some water/coolant came trickling out (it was cold) and I waited and after a short while boiling hot water started to come out and after a short while I then put back the coolant hose and did up the jubilee clip and bingo the heater was blowing out hot air!
i done up the bleed valves and put the coolant tank top on and that was it job done. - Make me sort of wonder why Fiat put a bleed valve on the inlet hose of the heater rad but not a bleed valve on the return side of the pipe?
Why I decided to go down the road of taking off the return pipe and letting the water flow until it was hot was because years ago our home central heating boiler was packing up and I had to refill the system with water and the boiler had an air lock in it and the only way I managed to clear it was to take the return pipe off the boiler to release the air and wait for the hot water to trickle through.
I hope that this will help someone who is having the same problems and absolutely racking their brains out when it comes to getting the air out of the coolant system on their Fiat punto. - Be careful though because the water could be scalding.
Andy.
I just wanted to pass on a tip to help people when they cannot get an air lock out when doing work on any of the coolant system on the Punto.
Last week I changed the heater rad (matrix) on my car and put all the coolant pipes back on and opened up the bleed screw on the radiator and the bleed screw on the heater 'Hot' coolant pipe in the engine compartment.
Started filling it up with antifreeze and water mixture put the inside heater control fully to Hot and switched the heater blower to full on and set the control to 'feet/interior heater' and started the engine. After a while I was having huge problems whereas the temperature gauge was shooting up to hot and the top hose was not getting hot (but the engine was!) and the fan didn't cut in. I turned off the engine and after a while the water went down in the expansion tank so I filled it up with some more coolant.
After a while i started up the engine again and the temperature gauge was staying one notch under the half way mark as normal and the fan was coming on and off but I had a problem that the interior heater was blowing out cold air even though the heater control was full on hot. I had the bleed valves open and was pressing hoses trying to expel air and still could not get the heater hot at all. it went on like this for ages and i was starting to think that maybe it being a new heater radiator that it might have a manufacturing fault and that it was blocked inside or that I left some kind of 'rubber bung' that i didn't take out and I would have to end up taking out all the dash again and sending the heater rad back!
anyway it went on like this for ages still blowing out cold air and then I had an Idea. I undid the jubilee clip on the heater return pipe in the engine compartment whilst the engine was still running/idling and gently pulled off the pipe and some water/coolant came trickling out (it was cold) and I waited and after a short while boiling hot water started to come out and after a short while I then put back the coolant hose and did up the jubilee clip and bingo the heater was blowing out hot air!
i done up the bleed valves and put the coolant tank top on and that was it job done. - Make me sort of wonder why Fiat put a bleed valve on the inlet hose of the heater rad but not a bleed valve on the return side of the pipe?
Why I decided to go down the road of taking off the return pipe and letting the water flow until it was hot was because years ago our home central heating boiler was packing up and I had to refill the system with water and the boiler had an air lock in it and the only way I managed to clear it was to take the return pipe off the boiler to release the air and wait for the hot water to trickle through.
I hope that this will help someone who is having the same problems and absolutely racking their brains out when it comes to getting the air out of the coolant system on their Fiat punto. - Be careful though because the water could be scalding.
Andy.
