boo hoo FML Ironic Story today

[broken_legs]

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj259/broken_legs/154955_10150312404660725_656195724_16018350_7593350_n.jpg

^^ This is what I came back to at the airport this afternoon. $250 for the pleasure of removing this thing from the parking lot.

The '94 Sunbird in a snowbank. Amazingly it started on the first try. She has never let me down once.

I left on what was supposed to be a 2-3 night trip to BC< that turned into almost 6 weeks so i didnt have any warm clothes or gloves, or snow scraper etc.. but i managed to get it all cleaned up with my hoodie sleeves and a credit card.

I get in the car to warm up - It is at this point I realize that the heater fan is not working for some reason (frozen????) fffffffffff!! Great... Pulling fuses with frozen fingers. Awesome. Can't fix it. ahh well, lets get going home now before rush hour gets really bad.

On the way out of the parking lot I stop and give some poor bastard a boost. For my troubles he gives me his gloves. Thank you dude! :)

So now Im driving down Deerfoot with the windows down so it doesn't frost up inside and I can see. Im shaking pretty violently by the time i get downtown.

I am stuck in traffic. but only 5 minutes from home, the same 5 minutes it took to stop and help buddy? Can't help but think this.

Here' the ironic part - The car with NO HEAT, OVERHEATS and dies in rush hour traffic. :facepalm: FML

And it was soooo easy to get a cab downtown when its -30 and rush hour too... ((not really))

How was your day? :)

[chkolny541]

how can a car overheat in -35 Celsius ?

[Modelexis]

My guess is this:

Coolant is either leaked out, or has frozen solid in the hoses preventing circulation and thus causing the overheating.

It's very hard to overheat a car in this cold weather, must be another problem.

I had an amazing day today btw. ;)

[JimmyBurner]

Originally posted by chkolny541
how can a car overheat in -35 Celsius ?

:facepalm:
Wow, and this is supposed to be a car enthusiast.
Just because it's -35 outside doesn't mean it's -35 in an internal combustion engine, because, you know, fire and explosions and fuel get a little warm in there.

[broken_legs]

Originally posted by chkolny541
how can a car overheat in -35 Celsius ?

Idling in traffic with no rad fan.

Didnt have the time or energy to check, but i think a relay has crapped out - perhaps one that runs the rad fan and the heater fan??

If Impark tows it, do I have to pay if I don't want it back?

[sr20s14zenki]

I bet you any money your coolant is not good down to -30 and it was frozen in your heater core and all thru your block. Im guessing because it was frozen, your engine temperature sending unit wasnt getting a signal thus your fan wasnt turning on.

[sillysod]

only thing with frozen block would mean that the water pump wouldn't turn properly.

should definately heard that....

did you save it in time or is the motor done?

[chkolny541]

Originally posted by Modelexis
My guess is this:

Coolant is either leaked out, or has frozen solid in the hoses preventing circulation and thus causing the overheating.

It's very hard to overheat a car in this cold weather, must be another problem.

I had an amazing day today btw. ;)
lol, i was just implying that its certainly not common nor easy for a car to die from overheating when its 35 below outside, as already stated there may be a mechanical problem with the cars coolant

[Sugarphreak]

...

[broken_legs]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak
That sucks dude, was nice of that guy you helped out to give you a pair of gloves though.



My old Jeep was terrible for overheating in extreme cold weather, I had added a water wetter into the radiator because it was overheating in the summer months a bit... worked great... But I guess in the winter months the wetter causes it to gel up. After suffering through it overheating and boiling over for a winter I had to get it flushed and a new pump installed.

My guess is frozen or partially frozen coolant is likely to blame, there is a good chance your water pump might need to be replaced too if it was running without circulating fluid.



Precisely! Which is why he wasn't getting any heat in the car either.


Thanks for the ideas guys, but 2 things

Not sure if its a different coolant sensor for the rad fan, but the temp gauge in the car was reading hot - so that much for sure was working.

Also, there was hot air, i could feel a little being sucked out when cruising at highway speeds - The problem was there was no fan for the heater to push it into the car.


So i don't know exactly what happened yet, but heres some more symptoms:

I notced the temperature was at the halfway mark when i was idling in traffic. This is more than twice the normal temperature, she always runs cool down around 1/8th of teh gauge. So when it started getting over half i was getting nervous and would turn off the car at red lights, then start it again to idle half a block, then turn it off again.

Anyhoo, it was running fine, then all of a sudden she just died and wouldn't start. I got it to turn over fine, even sputtered a little bit, but would not idle properly anymore. Could not get it to run, and it would die when i gave it throttle.

I'm assuming that the heat somehow caused this issue - but i guess it could be any number of things. Also the car was running for a good hour before this happened I'd say. 30 min in the parking lot, 30 min driving.

Anyways, its a bit of a mystery, but im off to work tomorrow so impark will probably end up towing it and then they can keep it. lol

Edit:

I checked all the plugs, battery, all cable seemed good. Played with the throttle and cable an it was moving freely. Not much else I could as I was turning blue at that point ha

[Sugarphreak]

...

[WrongWheelDrive]

Originally posted by chkolny541
how can a car overheat in -35 Celsius ?

:rofl:

That sounds like a brutal day man. Mine suddenly doesn't seem all that bad any more haha.

[G-ZUS]

Had my car pluuged in at work. Went to start it and nada the battery was fucked..Mystery how it started in the morning without being plugged in, but somehow did not start while plugged in. Tested it at Autovalue it had 512 CCA. Stood there for half an hour making phone calls and nother hour for my buddy to make it there in traffic.

[Kavy]

Add me to the shit day, heater stopped working in my 2 month old vehicle today 45 minutes from home.

Awesome.

[luxor]

Originally posted by chkolny541
how can a car overheat in -35 Celsius ?

:facepalm:

[chkolny541]

Originally posted by luxor


:facepalm:
great contribution, see earlier post

[Dilmah]

It's most likely the thermostat is stuck. Happens a lot in -30ish.

[Hakkola]

Shit man, my heater hasn't been working, not getting fixed until Friday or next week, these past few days have SUCKED.

[Benny]

Ugh my car's been sitting out for like 4 days now without being started and my battery has been on the fritz for a while.


It's gonna be boosty time in the morning :(

[Pinner]

Sounds like good times LoL, Been there too.

Block frozen, Check. Temp gauge works because the coolant in the block melted and shows heat to the gauge.

It overheated because everything else is frozen and the coolant can't go anywhere.

I'm surprised it started, fuel injection is amazing, try that with a carb.

If it started on it's own, maybe the belt isn't turning, so no charge to the alternator, the battery could be very dead so nothing left for the ac fan, just enough to run the engine.

[luxor]

Originally posted by chkolny541

great contribution, see earlier post


Originally posted by chkolny541

lol, i was just implying that its certainly not common nor easy for a car to die from overheating when its 35 below outside, as already stated there may be a mechanical problem with the cars coolant

Your attempt to save your image was still a fail. You actually said that the "cars" coolant may have had a MECHANICAL problem. Liquid coolant doesn't run into mechanical problems bud. Shows how much you know about the mechanics of automobiles.

The heat produced by the engine linearly increases with time, and without a cooling system it will reach its peak temperature. Regardless of how cold it is outside, inside the block in the cylinders where fuel is burnt is what counts. If the temperature is colder outside, the engine will dissipate more heat faster to its surrounding, but -30 isn't nearly cold enough to dissipate enough heat compared to what's being produced inside.

Couple that with a stuck thermostat, motionless coolant between the water jackets, cooling fan and blower fan not working. There isn't any way for the engine to cool off other than heat dissipation.

I would bet the thermostat was stuck closed. If your coolant frozen in the block, the expansion would have most likely cracked your block, or radiator, or hoses. A stuck water pump as chkolny541 was probably TRYING to suggest, would have caused your car to make nasty noises and possibly seized so not that either. If you want to keep your car then definitely check the thermostat, blower motor/fuse/relay and the cooling fan motor/fuses/relays. Either one of those fans could have saved your from overheating this afternoon.

[CUG]

Why all the Anal in here?

I'm considering putting winter fronts in my vehicle, deerfoot 3x today and the engine temp didn't creep past 60C

[StreetRacerX]

Say OP was that you pulled off to the side of southbound Mcleod downtown?

I have my own story to contribute to the thread, happened yesterday morning.

I'm on my way to pick up a co worker who lives in Elbow Valley, I make it to the set of lights just past Stone Pine and am in the left turning lane when I hear a loud pop and the van dies in the middle of the intersection, steam is coming out from under the hood and I immediatly catch on as to what has happened, I then get a call from the co worker who tells me he not coming in, I tell him to come get me but he says he can't so I get out of the van set up a couple pylons and walk about 4 km to his house, call the office so I can get a ride to work and the truck towed to the shop.

I feel bad for OP though, after being out on a Superstore rooftop the previous day for a couple hours working on a gasline I decided it would be best to pick up some insulated cover alls, and that was a good fucking idea.

[zieg]

Originally posted by luxor
The heat produced by the engine linearly increases with time

You know, if you go back and re-read that, maybe think it over for a few, it should become obvious to you that that statement isn't really true either. If it was, engines would continue to heat up no matter how good the cooling system was and long drives would be a lot more difficult. Rather, the heat energy produced by the engine is pretty much fixed at a certain point and the cooling system has a limited capacity. Also, since the laws of thermodynamics dont like to be broken, your statement would also imply that engines use more gas linearly with time. Anyhow, in the case of the OP, the cooling system wasnt able to bleed off as much heat as was being put into it, so eventually it overheated.


Don't get me wrong, I understand what you were saying, but since you just bitched someone else out for a technicality, I thought I'd call your attention to your own mistake.

[Modelexis]

Originally posted by luxor
The heat produced by the engine linearly increases with time

:facepalm:

(it's annoying isn't it?)

[racerjim]

If Impark tows your car, even if you dont want it anymore you are still on the hook for the bill. You can ignore it but it wont go away, eventually they submit it to the registry office and you have to pay up before you can use their services again. (renew plates, license, etc.)

Your best bet is to have your own towtruck go get it and haul it to a scrap yard if you no longer want the car.

Impark will nail you a min. of $100, but after storage before they get rid of it the bill will be near $500 at the registry office.

[msommers]

I remember when my heater core suddenly decided to die, it was a massive cloud of shit all over the inside of my windshield. Replacing the heater core when it was REALLY cold outside was not a fun job.

[BerserkerCatSplat]

Originally posted by CUG

I'm considering putting winter fronts in my vehicle, deerfoot 3x today and the engine temp didn't creep past 60C

Could be worse, my GF's car won't go past 60C even when sitting still. I'm thinking the thermostat is stuck open, even though I replaced the thermostat, water pump, and heater core within the last 6 months. Baffling.

[Modelexis]

Originally posted by BerserkerCatSplat


Could be worse, my GF's car won't go past 60C even when sitting still. I'm thinking the thermostat is stuck open, even though I replaced the thermostat, water pump, and heater core within the last 6 months. Baffling.

The car will heat up much faster with the car moving than with it standing still.

Standing still the motor has no load and is creating very little heat, but with a load the system will see the proper amount of heat needed to run up to operating temps.

[Kloubek]

Originally posted by Modelexis


The car will heat up much faster with the car moving than with it standing still.

Standing still the motor has no load and is creating very little heat, but with a load the system will see the proper amount of heat needed to run up to operating temps.

Well, yes and no. True, a no-load situation will cause less heat. However, cruising at low RPM as opposed to stopped at idle will usually create less heat since the radiator gets fresher, cooler air.

I recently had a major overheat situation in my Jeep. Guess the coolant was not adequate and it froze. Got me halfway home before it overheated, so I had to park it. (Not before getting caught in traffic and SERIOUSLY overheating the engine. I'm lucky I didn't fry it.) Went back 3 hours later, hoping the engine heat melted whatever blockage I had. No dice. I managed to get it home before it totally boiled over again. (I hope I wasn't hit by any red light cameras, since I had to run a couple.) Dropped 4l of straight coolant into the rad, parked it in the garage overnight with a ceramic heater blowing, and it was good to go in the morning.

Now I think my ratio has too MUCH coolant. But my heat is barely working so I need to flush the heater core and try to get some of it back. In doing so, I'm going to lose a bit of coolant while disconnecting the hoses so I'll just top it up with water and should be good to go.

[msommers]

Straight coolant? Holy crap. The highest I've EVER heard of was 70/30 and even then I'd personally only go 60/40.

[BerserkerCatSplat]

Originally posted by Modelexis


The car will heat up much faster with the car moving than with it standing still.

Standing still the motor has no load and is creating very little heat, but with a load the system will see the proper amount of heat needed to run up to operating temps.

I found that driving in traffic cooled it down, due to frigid air flowing through the radiator. Hence why I suspect the thermostat being stuck open, otherwise moving air over the rad would make very little difference to the coolant temp.

[gretz]

Originally posted by Modelexis


The car will heat up much faster with the car moving than with it standing still.

Standing still the motor has no load and is creating very little heat, but with a load the system will see the proper amount of heat needed to run up to operating temps.

Not true... especially in weather this cold...

When the engine is sitting in its own ambient heat, it gets warm quicker (safer)... When air travels through the rad, it cools the coolant... When the car is stationary, there is no air flowing through the rad = warmer conditions... Why do you think people put cardboard in front of their rad?

[Kloubek]

Originally posted by msommers
Straight coolant? Holy crap. The highest I've EVER heard of was 70/30 and even then I'd personally only go 60/40.

Well, I poured in straight coolant but there was still some of the old (mainly water, apparently) mixture in the system. I believe the Jeep rad holds about 10 litres, so that means I'm probably not actually THAT far off from a proper mixture as it is.

I estimate my original mixture was perhaps 25% coolant, and 75% water (given that the freezing point appeared to be about half of what it should have been). And if it took me 4 litres of straight coolant to top up the system, then that means it was about 60% old mixture, 40% new coolant.

So, 6 litres of 25% coolant equates to 1.5 litres of 100% coolant content. 1.5 litres + 4 litres = 5.5 litres. So right now, I should be running about a 55/45 mixture, give or take 5%.


Originally posted by Tik-Tok
It's probably not the mixture that's causing lack of heat, although coolant increases the boiling point of water, it still gets to engine temperature. You've probably either got air in the system, or need some cardboard on half your rad for these cold-ass days.

Oh no, it's not the mixture. The readings on the heat gauge are pretty close to what they were before I had this freezing issue. I'm just saying that I get very little heat so I need to flush the core. (Though an air pocket is a possibility as well) In doing so, I'm going to lose a little coolant so topping it up with straight water will probably get me really close to the 50/50 mark.

[Tik-Tok]

Originally posted by Kloubek


Now I think my ratio has too MUCH coolant. But my heat is barely working so I need to flush the heater core and try to get some of it back. In doing so, I'm going to lose a bit of coolant while disconnecting the hoses so I'll just top it up with water and should be good to go.

It's probably not the mixture that's causing lack of heat, although coolant increases the boiling point of water, it still gets to engine temperature. You've probably either got air in the system, or need some cardboard on half your rad for these cold-ass days.

[arian_ma]

At least you're laughing about it instead of letting it ruin the rest of your week or something!

[Tezzating]

Originally posted by broken_legs

Here' the ironic part - The car with NO HEAT, OVERHEATS and dies in rush hour traffic. :facepalm: FML

And it was soooo easy to get a cab downtown when its -30 and rush hour too... ((not really))

How was your day? :)

Broken inlet pipe on my radiator and a similar outcome, thanks for asking :thumbsup:

[Modelexis]

When I mention load, I don't mean idling in traffic.

Load creates the most/fastest heat but being that load creates movement it also increases efficiency of the cooling.

If you could create a load without movement, this would create the most heat with the least amount of efficiency (ie. dyno)

No load creates low heat initially but the reduced efficiency caused by the static state makes it harder to maintain temps.

[luxor]

Originally posted by ZiG-87


You know, if you go back and re-read that, maybe think it over for a few, it should become obvious to you that that statement isn't really true either. If it was, engines would continue to heat up no matter how good the cooling system was and long drives would be a lot more difficult. Rather, the heat energy produced by the engine is pretty much fixed at a certain point and the cooling system has a limited capacity. Also, since the laws of thermodynamics dont like to be broken, your statement would also imply that engines use more gas linearly with time. Anyhow, in the case of the OP, the cooling system wasnt able to bleed off as much heat as was being put into it, so eventually it overheated.


Don't get me wrong, I understand what you were saying, but since you just bitched someone else out for a technicality, I thought I'd call your attention to your own mistake.

Thanks for quoting a PART of the sentence that I wrote.

The FULL sentence I stated was:

"The heat produced by the engine linearly increases with time, and without a cooling system it will reach its peak temperature."

What part of peak temperature did you not understand, or did you purposely leave that out so you could call me out and try to look smart to impress somebody?

Did you really think I meant to say that temperature will increase to infinity with time? I guess if you were only able to comprehend part of my sentence, then yes.

:facepalm:

When I say "reach its peak temperature" that's exactly what I meant, the peak temperature, with the combustion of gasoline, that can take the engine block up to.

Operating temperature != peak temperature BTW, the peak is where the most an engine can heat up while running without any cooling system. Maybe picture a fairly straight line and plateau at that certain temperature, obviously the line won't be perfectly straight, as there are many factors affecting the fuel burn and heat produced.

Question for you is do you have a better way of describing the increase of temperature in the engine block with time? If it doesn't increase with time, and hit peak, then how else can you describe a temperature curve?

Don't get me wrong, I know you tried, but next time either read everything I say and quote accordingly or re-read until you finally understand.

[luxor]

Originally posted by Modelexis


:facepalm:

(it's annoying isn't it?)

I guess you're too much of an imbecile to read a full sentence as well. Please refer to above post, troll.

:thumbsdow

[zieg]

Originally posted by luxor


Thanks for quoting a PART of the sentence that I wrote.

The FULL sentence I stated was:

&quot;The heat produced by the engine linearly increases with time, and without a cooling system it will reach its peak temperature.&quot;

What part of peak temperature did you not understand, or did you purposely leave that out so you could call me out and try to look smart to impress somebody?

Did you really think I meant to say that temperature will increase to infinity with time? I guess if you were only able to comprehend part of my sentence, then yes.

:facepalm:

When I say &quot;reach its peak temperature&quot; that's exactly what I meant, the peak temperature, with the combustion of gasoline, that can take the engine block up to.

Operating temperature != peak temperature BTW, the peak is where the most an engine can heat up while running without any cooling system. Maybe picture a fairly straight line and plateau at that certain temperature, obviously the line won't be perfectly straight, as there are many factors affecting the fuel burn and heat produced.

Question for you is do you have a better way of describing the increase of temperature in the engine block with time? If it doesn't increase with time, and hit peak, then how else can you describe a temperature curve?

Don't get me wrong, I know you tried, but next time either read everything I say and quote accordingly or re-read until you finally understand.

Ohh, okay, I get it. You just thought temperature and heat were the same thing. First you said heat, then you said temperature towards the end of what I just quoted. No worries. It's an easy mistake to make.