In the latest issue with the money pit, I noticed the other day that my temp gauge barely moved up and had no heat. Not that lack of heat is surprising since the heat has never worked right, but the guage has never had a problem sitting around 190 even on the coldest days. The other odd thing is that I hear liquid running through the heater core when I step on the gas. The radiator is full so I have no idea what is causing that. I am assuming that the 1 year old thermostat must be stuck open. I am sure as with everything with this truck there must be more to it than just that.

 

You have air in the system. Need to burp it and possibly need a new rad cap.

 

I thought about that, but nothing on the cooling system has been touched in over a year, and the radiator cap is brand new.

When I started working on the heat issues last winter I changed the water pump, all the hoses, the thermostat, the thermostat housing, and installed the prestone flush kit. I have flushed it non stop, I have tried using the Lisle funnel, I have tried flushing the core with CLR. This is just the latest in my saga.

 

I'm dealing with a similar issue on a little Nissan Sentra. But on these trucks you almost have to put the front end on ramps to get all the air out. It's a pain in the ****. Hearing the gurgle means air is getting in. When it happened on my truck, it was due to a leaky heater core. And my carpet was dry too.

 

Sounds like you have two problems going on here. One good way to figure it out is let your truck run for a while with the radiator cap off. While running look in the radiator see if you see fluid moving if so and the fluid is cold then you have a bad thermostat and it is stuck open. Another thing that is real common on your truck is the bottom of the heater core will build up with crap and the fluid is bypassing the core completely so if your truck starts heating up but you have no heat in the cab that is what happens.

 

a good way to bleed them, if you didnt do this, is turn the heat on full blast with radiator cap off. put 1 jug of coolant in, and then turn truck on. (with heat on full blast) and add accordingly. when i didnt my water pump and fan clutch, i drained the whole system, and thats how i bled it. now it runs at 195 all the time, and have nice hot air, and ice cold a/c

 

I am thinking it must be the thermostat. I taped off the fan and did some stop and go driving. The gauge moved up near 200 degrees with the fan off sitting in traffic. Once the fan heated up and kicked in breaking the tape the temps dropped back down to 130 or so.