Around the end of June, I was driving down the highway and my belt tensioner went and broke right off. To my shock and horror I had to turn my car off cuz the battery light came on, the temperature gauge started sprinting to the top. and my steering went stiff. Was able to coast to the shoulder. I got my car towed and they fixed the tensioner and my car was driving fine. The temp really wasn't too hot out so my car's temp gauge made no jumps until I went on a long trip on the following Friday after getting my car repaired when the temp outside now was about I want to say 75 to 80 but cool air. About 25 miles out, my gauge starts rising and I thought that's weird but it remained at the level and didn't rise until I hit my exit. Made it to where I had to go without it fully overheating, just the needle sat at like 3/4 of the way. Took it to Goodyear when i got back and they changed the thermostat but nothing. I changed the clutch fan and nothing. About 2 years ago i had the water pump, radiator, hoses, and belt changed. they said condenser was good so no need to change that. No coolant leak, did the block test and nothing, all good. Drives great when it's cool out and temps doesn't jump up as much. I don't get it? I'm going to try rinsing the radiator off to see if that helps, read somewhere else there might be debris stuck in there.

What can it be if all this checks out? What else can I check that I didn't mention?

 

when the sudden raise in temperature from having no water pump happened some coolant may have started to boil. that may have an air bubble somewhere. when you had the thermostat changed, did they say that they fully got all of the air out of the cooling system? if not, that could be a cause for what you are seeing.

 

The accessories saw a lot of heat before that belt broke. I'd take a look at the water pump, I'm thinking if there is a plastic impeller it could have been damaged either by heat on the shaft or overheated coolant.

 

Hey guys,
Thanks for the suggestions. I believe they did a ****ty job at bleeding it so after reading Pierre's suggestion, I gave it a go. I must have done that thing for an hour and bubbles just kept coming. I finally saw no bubbles for like 5 minutes and the temp was back to normal so I closed the bleeder screw and popped the cap back on for a test drive but it still did it. I'm leaning towards maybe it is the water pump or a bad radiator. I'll weigh my options and let you all know what my result is.

 

are you loosing coolant level? do you see any on the ground in the morning after sitting? i would expect the radiator to have damage to the fins which would have happened at the same time as the belt snapped, but you would definitely see it leaking. i don't know how the water pump could have been damaged from what happened but it definitely could have been having some early signs of an issue and it got worse from getting too hot when the belt snapped.

 

No coolant leak on floor and belt didn't snap, the belt tensioner broke while driving causing it to be loose but not broken. I am thinking that it might be the radiator as well. Weather has been crap so I haven't had the chance to pull ****, once I get this resolved, I'll update again.