MacWolffe

my car's overheating now, it's been heating up more than normal for the past week but today it reached the red. i know there's a relatively small leak on the passenger side of the radiator. the heater is also not working which makes me wonder if the water pump is the problem. when i turn the heater on, it still blows cold air from the outside in. i am not gonna be driving it for a few weeks since my quarter is about to end so i am gonna have free time to try and fix it. but i need to know some possible problems that will cause this.

josephsc

Are you losing coolant anywhere? How's the coolant level? That'll help narrow down some possiblilities.

MacWolffe

i know i'm losing coolant but it's at a very slow rate. and i just filled up the coolant tank last wednesday, i think. my coolant reserve tank is soo damn yellow that i can't tell where it's at right now. i'm just suspecting the water pump cos the PO did not have any information on when the water pump and belts were changed. i don't really suspect the radiator cos the PO just replaced it last year with a new radiator.

MacWolffe

bump and update. on my way back from school where it started to overheat really bad. btw i live around 7-10mins away from school and it overheated to the point that i saw white smoke coming from the engine bay. anyways, i'm really starting to suspect the water pump cos i heard some gurgling from the passenger side floor and the heater started to work again, and the temp. gauge went down but it only lasted for a second and the temp. gauge went back up real quickly.

MM951

Wow..change the belts and water pump ASAP

your running on luck rightnow

Tom M'Guinn

If you have a leak in the system, you can/will get air trapped in the system. The gurgling sound is a sure sign that there is air trapped in the system. You can keep filling up the resevoir, but if air is in there (and it is, based on what you've said) then adding water will not help. I'd fix the leak, bleed the system completely (see archives) and the problem will probably be fixed.

The heater not working may be due to trapped air also, or a bad heater valve, or bad electronics/mechanics in the dash. If the water pump itself is not leaking, and is not making noise, and if you can't feel play in the pulley, then I think you are pre-mature pulling the waterpump without better evidence of its failure.
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Hard to say what was smoking when you over heated, or what might have been damaged (e.g. head gasket?), but suffice it to say you should shut off the motor if you canot keep it under the red area on the gauge.

MacWolffe

yeah i was thinking about vapor lock too. i'm gonna take off the timing belt cover and check the timing belt and water pump this weekend. so my question is what should i check for? loose bearings? leak at the water pump?

SoCal Driver

Grab the water pump pulley and see if you can wiggle it up and down. Bad pump bushings usually make a raspy sound when the car is running. A coolent leak from around the water pump pulley is also a big give away of a bad bushing.

And YES you are really pushing this. You may have blown a head gasket or done some other major damage to the engine letting it over heat.

Any leak in the cooling system will not let it pressurize and will cause an air bubble in the top of the engine. Not good.

MacWolffe

it's the first time it happened and after it did i have totaly stopped driving the car, it's just sitting in my complex wanting to be repaired.

Mike S

If you're loosing coolant your letting air into the system and that will cause your temp gauge to spike as someone already pointed out. Fix that radiator and bleed the system out properly. If you can afford it a new overflow container wouldn't hurt.