Thermostat Replacement

[Peter_W]

I’ve always been an attentive gauge watcher since my driving “formative years” in school when my appetite for owing various British and Italian sports cars was not always matched by the purchasing power to acquire well maintained examples. The Elan temperature gauge calibration showing at the ¾ mark before the fans kick in has me frequently scanning that gauge. Well, horrors, at a stoplight it kept rising to 7/8 with no fans kicking in, so I nursed it home with the heater on full bore.

Replacement was very straightforward as per Doug’s excellent write-up in the Repair section. I’ll offer up a few “for what it’s worth” comments using the Repair write-up as a reference:

Removing The Old Thermostat

Item 5 - I had plenty of room without removing the air filter canister – after removing the 2 small hoses as per item 7, the turbo air intake pipe connector snapped away from the canister and could be positioned aside providing good access.

Item 13 – The wire to my 'Radiator Temp Sensor (thermal switch)” had a snap-off connector, so the switch itself did not have to be removed.

Installing The New Thermostat

Item 3 – Probably an obvious comment – the thermostat mounting flange fits into a recessed surface in the engine outlet. Over the years I’ve heard tales (on other makes and models) of leaky replacements and occasionally cracked water outlet pipes because the thermostat was not seated properly.

[Peter_W]

Update – The Elan ran cooler today (maxed at 5/8 on the gauge) – w/o the fans coming on – than it did previous to the thermostat failure/replacement…which leads me to surmise that their function (ability of the sealed chamber containing a wax pellet that melts and expands at a set temperature to overcome the force of the spring, and thus open the valve) can fail progressively before the obvious failure of sticking closed.

[wayne]

I know what you mean about having one eye on the temp gaugue..... (Lotus and Fiat fan)!!

It's normally on the wrong side of 40C here and I have been struggling to keep my car cool for over 10 years...

I'm pleased that the new thermostat has sorted out the problems for you.

Recent approach here was replace the radiator. refit a lower temp thermostat and fan switch (thermostat was removed by last owner) !!
drained coolant and used distilled water and anti heat (watter wetter)?

Went for a spin last week and even with the air con on temp started at 1/4 and got up to about half way whilst sat in traffic for about 1 hour.... as soon as I got to open highway temp drops to 1/4. This is with an OAT of about 44C

Fans now come on at about 1/4.

Looking at upgrading the fans and fitting an oil cooler fan to try to cool things down more...

[Peter_W]

Wayne,

Those are great results you've achieved under those OAT conditions! I think an oil cooler fan would be a great addition for those conditions, especially while sitting in traffic.

[tigerdog]

I believe Marie has fitted oil cooler fans. I also think you could probably rig them pretty darned cheaply using 12V computer cooling fans. Maybe get some of those LED jobbies so your oil cooler would flash blue to match the paint when the fans are on. That'd be chavv-tastic!