Park the truck with the front end slightly uphill. Remove the radiator cap and start the engine allowing it to come up to temp and the thermostat to open. You'll know the stat has opened when you see the coolant starting to flow to the radiator. Keep adding coolant as necessary as the air bubbles out of the radiator. Keep adding coolant until you see no more air bubbles coming out. Depending on how much air is in the system this may take a little while so don't get in a hurry.

 

I did all that to begin with, and it hit 230 degrees after 10-15 minutes of burping the cooling system. When I changed the coolant 4-ish months ago and burped it the same way, it never got that hot.

 

If you happen to take pictures of your OEM plenum gasket, would you mind posting on the following thread?

https://dodgeforum.com/forum/2nd-gen...s-post-up.html


Think your tsat is not opening?

 

Yep, posted a description, but I'll dig my old plate and gasket out and take a picture today.

If I can't burp it again, then yeah, I might have to change the t-stat again.

 

I have a question, instead of the plenum repair with the 1/4" plate , why not put a new plenum on it with a solid bottom. I am asking because I saw some on e-bay and not much more money. No gasket to go bad equals permanent fix. Please give pro's and con's. Thanx

 

^Good point, except that to buy another intake manifold, none of the parts will fit on the new manifold as they did the old one, unless its the exact same design with a solid belly pan, the money to make everything work with the new manifold would be alot more than just the manifold cost, so it would probably be better just fixing the OE manifold

 

After I did my plenum repair, the initial burp was a nail biter, as the temp got pretty frigging warm.... there is an air pocket trapped below the thermostat, so the stat doesn't 'see' the temp as high as it really is, I idled up the engine a bit to stuff the coolant up there better, and it opened up. Took doing that a couple times before temps stabilized. I think I still have some air in there yet.....

 

That's a good point. I'll try burping it again tonight, maybe take it for a slow ride around the block to push that sucker out. Any idea how hot the engine can get before one should be worried about damage? My old Civic Si popped a CEL when it hit 230 or so (hit a 'coon and cracked my radiator, that was a fun night).

 

Trouble is, you don't really know how hot things are getting.... Keep the gauge out of the red, and you should be ok...... and don't stay too high to long. I would be more inclined to just do the throttle by hand, so you can add coolant as necessary......

One of These makes the job MUCH easier.

 

I have a Brockway R920 plugged in to the OBD-2 port, so I can see the exact temperature readings. I'll just keep trying to burp it and see what happens.