cooling issues

[bwake 5]

so im on my way to the track last night and i get about an hour out of town when my engine starts smoking. so i just pull over, pop it open and see that its coolant........ so i check the lines, nothing, then trace it back to the coolant overflow tank. and the car is pretty hot......... so i put a gallan and a half of water in both tanks and decide to drive back home because it wouldnt be worth it. the car didnt smoke again untill i got almost home and coolant started leaking out of the overflow tank again. i let it sit overnight and havent touched it since.......on my way home i tried to get on it a little bit and it bogged like crazy and shot out black smoke........

i dont know where to start......... this is what i have came up with tho

1) theres something wrong with the thermostat
2) the fan is not cooling the radiator enough

any ideas? i need some help please

[rican_nick]

thermostat is a good place to start

stock clutch fan? or are you using an electric fan?

[bwake 5]

i am using an electric fan that was taken off of a saturn sc2....the fan is pretty big, i thought it would have been better but im not sure

[Phlip]

Thermostat is a good place to start, flush/fill cooling as well.
Pressure test it as well, and pray that it is not your head gasket, but this is not sounding very encouraging.

[bwake 5]

while the electric fan is on although it is pushing extremely hot air through the front of the radiator

[bwake 5]

with the electric fan that i hooked up it is on the motor side of the radiator and is pulling air from the motor out towards the radiator. could it be that its just pushing hot air to the radiator? does the fan need to be pulling air from the outside through the radiator?

[ocska04]

well first of all to start off ur electric fan shouldnt be pushing air into ur radiator... the fan should be pulling air from the radiator thats what u want in the first place... cause u dont want the fan to push all the hot air from the engine into ur radiator cause its just gonna over heat ur radiator so u might have ur fan backwards... what u need is for the fan to pull air not push

[bwake 5]

well first of all to start off ur electric fan shouldnt be pushing air into ur radiator... the fan should be pulling air from the radiator thats what u want in the first place... cause u dont want the fan to push all the hot air from the engine into ur radiator cause its just gonna over heat ur radiator so u might have ur fan backwards... what u need is for the fan to pull air not push


well there is my first problem. lol

tonight i will switch around the wires on the fan to get it to pull air.
then i will flush the lines and put radiator fluid in it instead of just the water that i had put in it last night just to get me home
i will also replace the thermostat
then i will get a temperature gauge

hopefully all goes well. i havent tried to get on it while its cool but last night it wasnt letting me get on it without bogging on the top end side

[bwake 5]

bump!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


ok so i got all that done, the car runs fine and doesnt over heat....... pulls hard again and i thought that everything was perfect........

but, i pulled the spark plugs and they showed that i was running lean. they had white tipps and the top part of the threads were black showing i was burning oil right? so i change the plugs with some ngk bkr7's and drove it for 20 minuts, checked the plugs again and the tipps were white again........ theres no proplems while driving, but idk whats up

[bwake 5]

i have the walboro 255 and everything on the car feels fine now. but the plugs show lean..........