I have an 82 rx-7. I was driving the thing from dallas to austin yesterday, and it started to overheat half way. I pulled over and let it cool/ try and fix it then kept goin, still overheated. The car stayed at midway between hot and cold. if I did 30. So I took the service road the 120 miles. It took me nine hours to get to austin. Since I stopped to lock my fan up with a shoe lace, to help cool it better. It worked for 10 miles I could go 40, then it broke, and I had to stay at 30 mph. I checked my thermostat it works fine. I found that if I turned the lights off the engine cooled significantly, I was driving at night. So it might just be wiring, I bought the car from someone, who ripped the thing apart before I got a hold of it. I'm goin to try driving it without lights on and see if the temp. remains normal. Then I'm goin to flush the system if that doesn't work. Any other suggestions? I didn't see anything about overheating in the archives thats why I'm posting this up. Thanks

Chris

 

When you say overheat, do you mean that the temperature gauge pinged at the top or that the actual cooling system was overheating.

A couple of guys on the fourms have had major issues with their temperature gauges reading incorrectly.

 

temp gauge was goin towards the top, didn't let it get to the top. There wasn't any steam coming from the radiator, when I took the cap off.

 

Hmm... Check the wire that goes to your temp gauge, see if its not broken or corroded. I would say that if you didn't boil your face off when you took the radiator cap off and the car didn't seem like it was overheating.

You may have an electrical problem. This is under the assumption that your car is not actually overheating though.

 

This might be of some use.

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...ht=overheating

As long as you have checked all of the regular things that can cause an overheat situation.

 

The guages often read low if they are not operating properly check the gauge or get one of those heat guns measurees ( like infrared or w/e) and measure the temp of the rad near the top rad hose of the t-stat. gives a rough idea

 

Does anyone know what normal operating temperature is? I'm going to test using an infrared sensor I can get. If that shows the temperature steady I'll redo my grounds. Thanks for the help. I'll keep you guys updated.

 

pretty sure its 180 ish, some t-stats are 160 some are 180.

 

The problem was a sort on one of my ground wires. Same exact wire the guy in the archives had problems with didn't see the post because I searched overheat not overheating. Thanks for the help.

 

Not a problem.

 

Thanks for getting back to us.

So the engine was NOT actually overheating? It was just bad readings caused by a lifted ground wire?

This is very interesting. It could happen to anyone, at any time.