I have the antifreeze set to -40 F I drained the radiator this afternoon and put fresh antifreeze in because I have never had heat in the 2 years I owned this thing its a 1996 dodge ram 2500 with a 8L engine ( V10) problem is the upper radiator hose gets hot after 10 minutes or idleing like it should but the lower radiator hose is still cold is this normal? I changed the water pump and hoses last year because of a leak and age
Is this normal after 10 minutes ? will it heat up the lower hose if I drive it a while? or is something really bad wrong

 

Temp guage reads engine temp, not radiator..... so hot upper hose, cold lower hose is not out of the ordinary. In my experience, the heat in these trucks has always sucked. My 96, I could never get anything better than **** warm, my 98 with the V-10 isn't much better. Even after having the cooling system flushed, heat is still mediocre. It's annoying. I have had four cylinder cars that would burn me out of the seat with the heater, regardless of how cold it was outside. (of course, there was the conquest too...... heat wasn't the best, but, when it's -5 outside, I don't expect miracles.... your feet could be warm, or, you could see out the windshield, but, not both at the same time.)

I think the biggest problem is trapped air in the heater core, another potential issue is the little blend door motor on 2000 and newer trucks. (maybe 99??) Getting all the air out can be problematic, and it appears the V-10 suffers the same problem. I have yet to find a solution.... And then we have blend doors that break, insulation that dries up and blows away, so more air bypasses the heater core than goes thru it, stuff getting sucked in, and blocking airflow thru the entire system, etc....

 

Check your temp heater core hoses, in and out. Infrared gun works great.

 

Yea I had a 76 Toyota you could drive arpund win you skivues in Jan and seat, and I had an 80 Laborn, I actually put a aux heater into

heater core hoses on a v 10 are not the easiest to get to lol, guess I'll find out this morning, it's 24 and I am getting ready for work after 15 miles at 60 mph there should be some eresembelence of heat if not maybe I need an aux heater in this too? I changed the water pump and ghat weird looking thing they call a thermostat last year

 

You should be feeling heat before the upper radiator hose gets hot. The motor circulates coolant to the heater core constantly. Do you hear the door close when you move the temp **** to the right? You can feel the hoses going to heater core to see if they are getting hot. If they are the problem is in the hvac unit.

 

If you are needing to replace your blend doors, be sure to check out our website. Great quality product made right here in the USA.
https://www.blenddoorusa.com/

 

Nope no heat before the upper hose gets hot

 

Thanks, i bookmarked that site

 

I drove to work today 14 miles away, no overheat, but I DID have a little heat, the blend door works fine, I glued new foam over it last year after I evicted the mice for living in there LOL, I just wonder if the radiator hoses are clogged up or if ones collapsed

 

Do you have a laser temperature gun? (here's an example - https://www.harborfreight.com/121-in...ter-63985.html)

If so, what are the temperature readings for the inlet and outlet heater hoses?