Car turned off.. too hot?

[Dean]

Ok.
So my radiator basically shit itself. It was blocked somehow.
Anyways, i drove the car to work in the morning, even though overheating a little bit. My instinct told me to drive it back home despite the problems later on.
So it was overheating, when in traffic would get really hot, when i accelerated it cooled down a little bit.
Anyways, i know the radiator is gone, thats not my drama.
I persevered to get it home, being as careful as possible.
As i was driving away, on the highway doing 100, i thought going that fast it would keep the air venting through and keep it cool, but it didnt, the temp stayed really high.. then, like 500metres away from home the car just turned off!
So my question is... why did it turn off?
Would that be an ECU thing, would the ECU have said, sorry your too hot im turning you off?
Could i have possibly blown a head?
Or have i completely fried my motor... again
Any help would be appreciated.
Cheers

 

[DOUGMO]

doesnt sound too good dean, how much water did you loose?

did it cut out and then coast to a stop?

 

[Dean]

Yeh it just cut out, turned off.
My overfill bottle was quite full. there must have been a block inbetween that and the radiator, before i turned the car on i filled the radiator then headed home. So probably lost a fair bit.
I dont think that was the wisest thing to do to try and drive it home

 

[EVO-00X]

A little tip for next time Dean if you have to drive the car whilst it is running hot, to cool the temp down you should wind all of your windows down in your car and turn the heater on full ball and fan on full speed. The heater core will disperse a lot of the heat from your water keeping the water temp lower and not from getting as high I dont think the ECU has a failsafe/temperature cut off so hopefully you havent damaged anything. Give it another try after it cools down mate and get it home with the heater going as per above.

Have you check the water to see if there is any sign of oil in it? (milky crap). Also give the car a rev and have a mate place his hand over the exhaust tip to see if its spitting out milky water from the exhaust too. This would be one of the signs of a headgasket problem.

Actually, just to rule the radiator out, I would get the car home and let it cool down. Then I would run the car from a complete cold start and let it idle, all the time going between watching the temp gauge rising and feeling the temp of the bottom radiator hose. The temp gauge should get to about 2/3rds high when the thermostat should open and the thermo fans cut in and the bottom radiator hose will get hot water run through it making it feel hot. If the thermos cut in and the bottom radiator hose gets hot then the thermostat is opening to let water through and working properly. If the temp goes all the way up and the bottom radiator hose doesnt get hot then your thermostat has siezed and this will be the cause of your overheating. Its an easy job to replace it.

 

[Dean]

as soon as it turned off i tried to restart it again... and it gave me like a "flat battery" type of thing.. it wouldnt kick over
i havnt tried it recently though but as soon as i get home from work i'll try and kick it over and start ruling some things out.
P.s. thanks for the tips. hopefully i'll never have to use them!! lol

 

[bazeng]

Not good mate,

Getting the motor so hot causes the metals to expand which can then cause parts to seize.

Things may melt ie pistons, your head could have warped, so many different scenario's.

I've had a mazda 929 cut out on me when it over heated.... I let it sit for a night and strated it up again and it ran but was leaking water from the head. I used some of that cheap fix powder and it cured it. (it was a POS anyway).

Fingers crossed you haven't caused major damage!

 

[Dean]

here we go again...

 

[S15ETA]

get a 2L half cut!

 

[Dean]

might be a possibilty.
Lets see how we go ai, otherwise i might go Dave style and go ALL OUT!
p.s. nice sig

 

[EVO-00X]

Whatever you do dont ever use that Oil Stop Leak crap in your car. I've just witnessed what shit like that can do to piston pin holes around the oil ring and gudgeon pin holes... i.e. clog them up!!! The previous Nimbus owner said to me that he used a lot of that crap to stop the car from smoking (what a dickhead, the rings were worn and way overdue). I just rebuilt the engine and had to dig out each and every pin hole with a small precision screwdriver because they were clogged with rock hard crap which would have accelerated the wear!

Gee I hope you havent near seized any of the valvetrain or internal engine components and the slow crank of the battery is because the engine is too difficult to crank over and rotate. Hopefully the flat battery symptom is the battery itself!!! Too much heat can kill them just as much as the cold can.

 

[cblancergsr]

try turning the crank and if you cant turn it id bet on a seized motor i saw one the other day at work that did the same thing but it was a holden astra or it could also be a faulty starter motor and its tried restarting while the engines running

 

[Dean]

yeh hopefully its nothing too serious.
I took the radiator out tonight, it came out a little bit milky.
little bit rusty aswell.
the big question is whether my internals have seized.

 

[DOUGMO]

rust and milk is not good, you have probably cracked the head or best case done the headgasket.

if oil and water mix it never ends up cheap,well for me anyway

 

[JSTYLE]

yeh hopefully its nothing too serious.
I took the radiator out tonight, it came out a little bit milky.
little bit rusty aswell.
the big question is whether my internals have seized.

ouch.. must of really gotten hot or really bad to have milky water in the radiator!!!

im on the same thoughts as george.. best case is probably a head gasket and worste case is a crack or seizure.

Jon

 

[Dean]

Well fuk me dead.
I temporarily put everything back on just out of curiosity, and it cranked over!!
Im still going to be getting a new radiator so not planning on driving it till then.
does this rule out any internal damage?
if not what sort of things will i be looking out for?

 

[DOUGMO]

it just means its not seized dean.

head could still be cracked or the gasket still blown

 

[Richard]

Aye Dean, have a crack at Harry! You two are a funny pair of bastards!


Just coz it started doesnt mean it's not broken! You have probably blown your head gasket if the coolant came out milky...

 

[Dean]

Aye Dean, have a crack at Harry! You two are a funny pair of bastards!


Just coz it started doesnt mean it's not broken! You have probably blown your head gasket if the coolant came out milky...

ahaha. Yeh Harry's allright man. No harm in a little fun
ahh ok.
Ill have to bring it down to the mechanics and get them to check it out then hey.
Thanks for the help guys.

 

[cblancergsr]

you didnt need too temperarily put everything back together too start it every mechanic will leave the radiator and cooling fans out and all alot of parts out just crank it over too make sure everythings starts but they only do it for a couple of seconds

 

[cblancergsr]

but id defitently get the head gasket checked out and most good mechanics would recomend replace the radiator too ease the flushing process