Cooling Issues

[par]

Its been nearly 2 weeks since I last had a run in the Elan so decided to start it and leave it running and let the fans cycle while I was doing a little tidying up of the sagging roof bar elastic straps. Got caught up in stitching in new elastic but happened to glance at the temp gauge and noticed the needle was almost right at the top of the scale and the fans hadnt kicked in, opened the bonnet and coolant had started spilling out the header tank so stopped the engine and let it cool a bit.

Had a bit of a read on here and checked that the fans work by earthing the wire from the fan sensor and they do come on. So I thought that it may be the fan temp sensor is faulty but noticed that if the fan sensor is earthed with the ignition off this operates the electric water pump and this does seem to kick in after turning the engine on so it appears that the temp sensor is working - is that a correct assumption?

Normally with my car when the fans cut in the temp gauge drops quite quickly but tried manually operating the fans with the engine running and it didnt make much of a difference so i thought it might have airlocked. Let the the engine cool down again and removed the expansion tank cap and let the car idle and there seemed to be a few bubbles clearing out the system but again temp guage went to the top and the coolant boiled over with no fans kicking in, there also seemed to be a jet of coolant leaking from the hose that goes from the Y hose at the front of the bay to the bottom of the expansion tank. While trying to locate the jet of coolant I noticed the hose that runs parallel to the suspect hose and connects to the electric water pump was slipping off - the jubilee clip was on the wrong side of the retaining bump! So again let it cool down and fitted the hose to the electric pump correctly.

In between I had taken it out for a run as the gauge is usually just off the bottom mark when moving through the air but again the needle crept up to the top of the scale, setting the interior heating to full did bring it down a little.

In summary: fans do not cut in, electric water pump does cut in when engine switched off, manually operating the fans does not lower temp, might have a pin hole in the hose to the expansion tank. I am thinking the symptoms point to an air lock or stuck thermostat (or both), possible leak in hose and possible faulty fan temp sensor (not sure if this triggers the electric water pump or if it operates off a timer). Will let the car cool down and have look while cold to see if the hose is leaking later this week.

One last thing I noticed is that the coolant colour is pink which suggests it is OAT, I though the engines in the Elan need the blue variety?

Grateful for any guidance and suggestions.

[Jamie N]

My old Pacific blue used to do a similar thing Steven, although the fans were operating it did not like idling for any great length of time and the needle would go fairly quickly to the upper limits, but soon after driving again it would quickly come back down, there were no H/G issues and it had a new thermostat, although it never reached the stage of boiling over or splitting hoses and never caused any other problems, but it certainly looked alarming going by the gauge, i have always felt the temperature gauge on Elans were not very accurate.
I just made sure it never sat idling for too long and it was fine.

I would let it cool right down, refill the system and purge any air, then take it a run and see how it performs from there.

[dapinky]

And don't forget that once it's cooled down and re-filled, you also need to bleed the air from the radiator (plug underneath the passenger-side headlamp pod).

[Jamie N]

And don't forget that once it's cooled down and re-filled, you also need to bleed the air from the radiator (plug underneath the passenger-side headlamp pod).

And go gentle loosening it as it could snap right off!.

[par]

Thanks guys, will give it a go tomorrow night.

What about the colour of the antifreeze - should it be pink or blue?

[Jamie N]

I always use blue.

[par]

Thats what I thought. I will probably keep just topping up with water until I get it sorted out and then do a complete change, which will probably end up with another airlock and go through it all again

[Rambo]

It really should be blue or green (ethylene glycol based rather than the more modern pink stuff OAT - organic acid technology) When the Elan came out 25 years ago the EG coolant was the only form of coolant anyway. The new fangled pink stuff doesn't suit all metals so probably best avoided for all older cars

Having said that red Rambo changed to OAT sometime in its life and I've never really been happy with it as I have had a few weeps and leaks - Big Erch even spotted one today at Duns I need to do a good clean out and flush then fill up with the recommended strength blue stuff

[TStevens]

OAT has a tendency to eat brass - which there is some of in the Elan cooling system. Flush it and get some Glycol in there.

[niall]

Have your hoses been renewed at any stage or is there a chance that one or other of them has broken down inside and blocked itself?
By the way, my mother was from the Kingdom of Fife!

[par]

Have your hoses been renewed at any stage or is there a chance that one or other of them has broken down inside and blocked itself?
By the way, my mother was from the Kingdom of Fife!

Not sure, I have only had the car a couple of months but never had a hint of a cooling issue until now.

By coincidence my mother was from Fife as well, she didnt know much about Elan cooling systems though

[Scott J]

its all original hoses, so 25 years old.

[dapinky]

By coincidence my mother was from Fife as well, she didnt know much about Elan cooling systems though

My mother wasn't and neither did she

(but my eldest son is moving to Fife this week)

[Jamie N]

By coincidence my mother was from Fife as well, she didnt know much about Elan cooling systems though

My mother wasn't and neither did she

(but my eldest son is moving to Fife this week)

God help him! , I remember reading a book called "A Tour of Scotland" by a well known Author and how it described County by County, with some of the greatest and evocotive rhetoric describing the beauty of the landscape and wildlife from the Stunning Borders to the breathtaking heights of Wester Ross and Sutherland, when it reached Fife all it said was " Mainly a land of Industrialised squallor " . I live there and i cant wait till i move!.

[dapinky]

It's not his choice - He's in the Scots Dragoon Guards who have been in Germany for 20 odd years - but the whole Regiment is relocating back to the UK at Leuchars.

[epipete]

Oh, of course, don't you just love Polititions, putting the Army there to replace the Typhoon Sqd makes for a much better Quick Reaction Alert for the Northern United Kingdom. The Ruskies must be trembling

Sorry, I mustn't be political, I'll get my coat

[Scott J]

Steven.

Occasionally I had tiny puddle of water on garage floor, expansion tank went down very very slowly, negligible. I could never trace a leak. Maybe year or so ago when car was in garage for MOT & service they left it running on the ramps for a good while. Couldn't locate anything. Thought it might be the original expansion tank cap so I replaced that with the newer yellow Corsa ones. Garage then drained the whole system and flushed out the rad, +20 yrs crud. It was at that stage that the pink modern coolant went in. I was unaware this was incorrect. It may be they didn't bleed the system properly etc .......

Scott

[epipete]

So, specifically, what components does it attack, if you have had the wrong stuff in then what needs to be considered as vulnerable areas?

[par]

Steven.

Occasionally I had tiny puddle of water on garage floor, expansion tank went down very very slowly, negligible. I could never trace a leak. Maybe year or so ago when car was in garage for MOT & service they left it running on the ramps for a good while. Couldn't locate anything. Thought it might be the original expansion tank cap so I replaced that with the newer yellow Corsa ones. Garage then drained the whole system and flushed out the rad, +20 yrs crud. It was at that stage that the pink modern coolant went in. I was unaware this was incorrect. It may be they didn't bleed the system properly etc .......

Scott

Thanks Scott,

As I said at one point I am sure I could see a jet of water from one of the hoses but that was when it was boiling over so was under a lot of pressure and would have just been a pinhole, dont really want to get it as hot again to replicate, that might have been where the small leak was from. I have ordered a new fan switch sensor, heater control valve, will see if I can find a replacement length of hose, change to the glycol antifreeze and give it a good bleed. Not sure whether to add thermostat to the list or not.

[epipete]

Yes, add the thermostat, it gives some piece of mind particularly as, iirc, the fan switch is the wrong side of the thermostat!