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Car overheats at an idle

mok4200

New member
Car:1997 Grand Prix GT 3.8l N/A

Car temp is fine when driving, but gets waaaayyy too hot when at an idle, often have to turn the car off in a drive-thru or traffic. I do not hear the fans coming on, anyone have any good suggestions on how to check the fan motor?
 


lim. lower intake manifold.

where the upper rad hose meets the engine, under that part is a sensor and a plug. unplug it.
 


does your a/c work? or is that also not working? if the ac works the fans will turn on automatically full time with the ac.

if the ac dont work due to a leak or whatever it wont turn the fans on. has nothing to do with your issue. just letting you know more what will turn them on.
 
ok cause thats one way to see if they "work" could also be a bad relay. you can swap them around in the fuse box to see if the fans will then work.

unplugging the temp sensor will make the fans turn on asap if the relays are working.
 
unplugging the temp sensor will make the fans turn on asap if the relays are working.

Awesome. If that doesnt work, ill get a new relay just in case, and take a look at the fuse. It should be something simple, it used to work great, then i just just stuck in traffic one hot day and looked down and my temp was almost to red. put the heat on full blast and went the back ways, and it went back down
 
I had a problem with this and it was the Dex-Cool chunking up and making the thermostat stick. Drained the orange Dex-Cool and flushed the collant system, no problems since. That was about 40k miles ago.
 


IDK if the fans came on with the AC on then the fan relays, fuses and wiring should all be good. Unless there is a separate relay that turns them on for AC
 


Heres a thought (probably should have mentioned this)...My "Low coolant" like often flashes, as well as sometimes stays solid, Is my coolant sensor perhaps playing into this?
 
dont think so, if the rad is full. the low coolant sensor is dirty or broken. unplugging it turns off the light full time.
 
dont think so, if the rad is full. the low coolant sensor is dirty or broken. unplugging it turns off the light full time.

Okay. I wonder if i need to bleed the system..When i seen the low coolant come on, i added coolant. But that was a month or so ago, it should have worked its way out. I don't think this is what would be causing it, but some people on other forums are saying it has happened.
 
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