Overheating - Help!

[GreyArea]

My Wife's borrowed my car and apparently it's been overheating in London traffic. She had a look at the coolant level and thinks it's low. Is it OK to put water in to top it up, temporarily? The manual says it needs to be special ethylene glycol mix. Would the AA carry that sort of thing?

[postie]

My Wife's borrowed my car and apparently it's been overheating in London traffic. She had a look at the coolant level and thinks it's low. Is it OK to put water in to top it up, temporarily? The manual says it needs to be special ethylene glycol mix. Would the AA carry that sort of thing?

you can get that coolant from most petrol garages-just check the label for ethylene glycol not ethanol

[Noel]

be sure to let it cool first before adding anything....

[GreyArea]

Yeah, she knows about the danger of hot water under pressure. I think she's going to call out the AA, just to check the fan and thermostat are both working.

[Noel]

Yeah, she knows about the danger of hot water under pressure. I think she's going to call out the AA, just to check the fan and thermostat are both working.

that too...

but i am referring to rapid cooling can fook up your engine....

[GreyArea]

Oh yeah, hadn't thought of that! Oh well, she's called the AA, I'm sure they'll know what to do.

[GreyArea]

Follow-up - not a coolant problem after all, the radiator fan isn't working, apparently. Hope it's not too expensive to get fixed, but the AA man said if it happens again, to turn on the A/C and that will help cool the engine down, which is something I didn't know.

[Rob]

actually it wouldnt because the AC heat exchanger is in front of the radiator, the only way it would do that is by turning on the rad fans to create an air flow but as the rad fan isnt working....

[Tango]

Follow-up - not a coolant problem after all, the radiator fan isn't working, apparently. Hope it's not too expensive to get fixed, but the AA man said if it happens again, to turn on the A/C and that will help cool the engine down, which is something I didn't know.

He'd better go in for re-training then..you sure he didn't say turn the heater on to full??? That would help.turning on the A/C would require more output from the motor, so would have the opposite effect. :o

[GreyArea]

Well I told my wife to put the heater on and that helped. The AA man reckoned the A/C fan would draw air over the rad. Seemed a bit odd to me, as I thought having the A/C would put more load on the engine and make it hotter...

However, just found this:

Depending on why your car is overheating you might want to turn the air conditioning on. Some cars have electric fans. The fan is turned on by a computer, based on a reading from a temperature sensor. Sometimes this system will fail and not engage the fan. Some of these cars automatically turn the fan on when the air conditioning is turned on, overriding the failed components.

So the AA man was right!