A friend and local rotary guru has been helping me out with some cooling issues. However he mainly works with FCs.
Car over heating, losing coolant, coolant does not have oil of gunk in it, not leaking out of the block (onto the ground), did some troubleshooting. He said find the bleeder plug, but he isn't sure if FBs actually have them. Can't find any info on it, assuming that there isn't one but I wanted to double check. Feel free to leave other advice. I also suspect my water pump may have crapped out on me. I have done extensive tinkering and research, this is my 3rd FB.

 

Water pumps usually work until they develop a leak , if it was leaking you would see a puddle on the floor or be seeping out the weep hole . It is possible but very rare for a propeller to spin on the shaft and not work .

 

Thanks for the comment!

 

There is no bleeder on FB radiators normally. You have to crack the bottom hose or drain it from
the block plug just under the leading plug area.

Describe your overheating. How do you know its overheating? Are both hoses to the waterpump
getting hot? Is this a beehive or FMOC oil cooler?

 

My 85 GSL-SE has a drain plug on the radiator, not a bleeder plug, but a plastic drain plug. I was having overheating on my motor, too. Flushed radiator, cleaing solutions, etc. Still ran, a little warm, not too bad. When it finally died and I took the engine apart, I found the cooling passages of the housings and irons clogged with all kinds of crap. Not saying your engine is in the same condition, after all, I used Bars Leaks a while back and didn't change the coolant every year like I should have, but just keep the engine itself as a possible cause of the overheating.

 

To bleed air out of the system:

- While your engine is cool, for obvious reasons, take your radiator cap off
- Start the car and let it get to it's normal operating temperature
- If you have air bubbles, you will need to add coolant/water/mixture as the bubbles escape

This also a great time to test to see if it could be other things. As you car starts reaching normal operating temps, grab both radiator hoses. They should be approximately the same temperature. If one is substantially cooler than the other, then you likely have a bad thermostat or possible clog in the system.

When adding water to your system, don't cheap out, go spend a $1 and get a gallon of distilled water. Water from a hose will damage your engine over time.

 

only the S4 FC has a bleeder plug.

 

Do you know if the S4 bleeder will fit the 1984/85 radiator? The one I have has a plastic plug and it has always botthered me that I can't control how much water is drained. Last time I drained mine the antifreeae did a number on my powder coated crosss member.

 

my thought is that if you are not dripping coolant but are losing it, you have a faulty housing to iron coolant seal or a corroded housing around one of the coolant seals. this will allow coolant into the combustion process. the engine will consume coolant until repaired.

 

Kind of odd info but the S4 bleeder is also interchangeable with the S4 Drain on the Rad.
SO,If the FC Drain fits the FB rad,the Bleeder will too.

 

I had always assumed that I had a broken coolant seal, but my friend told me if that were the case, that I'd have oil and gunk floating in my radiator.
It's an '85 five letter.
Beehive.
I only ever feel the hose going to the top of the thermostat, it's about as hot as they tend to get.
I have flushed the radiator. Last time was about three months ago, and since then I've gone through 5 jugs of coolant and several gallons of water. From gradual loss, and from the occasional total reserve blowout.
After driving a couple miles the temp gauge will be past the highest mark, the reserve lid will blow off and coolant fountains out of it creating a ridiculous amount of steam.
I did what you suggested, aws140, but I didn't let it run for that long.. I probably should have. I turned it off after about three minutes, put some water in it, tried to start it again about 5 minutes later and it had flooded and the battery died from turning the motor over.

 

there;s really not much chance of oil mixing with the coolant during a coolant seal failure. it would have to be a SEVER corrosion far into a dowl pin o-ring area.

the GSL-SE's do not have a beehive oil cooler. they have an air to oil oil cooler mounted under the radiator. the GSL-SE's were also fuel injected and had a different bolt pattern for the wheels, vented rear disc brakes, and larger front brakes. they also have power windows and mirrors, removable sunroof, a/c, Clarion ETR stereo, and leather and power steering as options. the SE also had sightly different cloth seats.

 

What you have described is a textbox case of a bad coolant seal or corrosion as mentioned before. What i happening is that combustion gases are getting into the coolant system and pressurized it. Hence, the overflow bottle symptoms. I corrosion on a water seal so bad that water was shooting 20 feet across the barn out the pinhole in the top of the overflow bottle and water was POURING out the end of the tailpipe.

Driving the car will only toast the engine with the high temps. With an engine like this, I like to pull them and disassemble before any more damage is done.

 

Thank you for confirming, Kansas. There is now a pinhole in my reserve lid, and last time I drove it, coolant shot out of it several feet, as well.
Sounds like I have some work ahead of me. My 7 has 190,000 miles, by the way.
I'm not looking forward to trying to figure out the rat's nest...