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EFV-8 Club Forum / General Ford Discussion / Overheating Flathead

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Posted By Discussion Topic: Overheating Flathead -- page: 1 2     TomO 10-22-2009 @ 10:29 AM reply profile send p.m. Senior Posts: 7250 Joined: Oct 2009 Over heating is usually due to poor circulation of the coolant or insufficient coolant. Water transfers heat better than antifreeze-water mixture. Other causes are brakes binding or exhaust plugged. If the overheating only occurs at slow speeds, the fan is the problem. At speeds above 20mph the fan is unnecessary to cool the engine. Because the problem started suddenly, I would first suspect the thermostats then in order a bad water pump, leaky head gasket or plugged exhaust. If you can see signs of coolant circulating in the radiator, remove your thermostats and drive the car. If the temperature drops significantly, the thermostats are the problem. If the temperature drop is slight, then your radiator need to be flow checked and checked to make sure that the fins are attached and allowing air to cool the coolant. Tom Grant 10-22-2009 @ 11:50 AM reply profile send p.m. Senior Posts: 535 Joined: Oct 2009 Hi Andy, Our '52 Ranch Wagon's 239 V8 started running hot after it was rebuilt. The problem turned out to have nothing to do with the cooling system. The metal vacuum line that runs from the diaphragm on the distributor to the carburetor was leaking. If you undo the nuts at each end which hold the line on, you will see that the ends of the line are flared ....... something like a brake line. Over the years the flared ends had worn enough to be sloppy. As soon as the flares were re-shaped to fit tightly and the line was re-installed, the overheating problem stopped. Before re-flaring the ends of this vacuum line, our TEMP guage was reading between the M and the P.....the needle had deflected 75% or 80% of the way over. Now that the line has been repaired and the vacuum leak has stopped, the needle isn't going any further than half-way between the T and the E. Perhaps this is your problem as well. One caveat ...... be very careful when doing up the threaded fittings: if you are not careful, you might strip the threads (especially at the carburetor). Hopefully your overheating issue will be as easy to correct as ours was. Best regards, Grant 37RAGTOPMAN 10-22-2009 @ 4:55 PM reply profile send p.m. Senior Posts: 1958 Joined: Oct 2009 does it overheat when idling ? or driving down the road, usually a back fire is from a leaking exhaust gasket, or maybe a leaking intake gasket ? if it overheats while driving, check the timing, it might be retarded, or not advancing when accelerating this will cause it to run hot in a hurry. is there any dragging like a sticking brake ? maybe the handbrake not releasing fully ? do a few check and lets hear how you made out, hope this helps 37RAGTOPMAN ford38v8 10-22-2009 @ 7:57 PM reply profile send p.m. Senior Posts: 2758 Joined: Oct 2009 Scott, I'll side with the others here. We'll all gang up on you and put a flat motor in that brand x of yours. Your point that antifreeze boils at a higher temp than water is not at issue. We're talking about cooling system efficiency here: Plain old water transfers heat better than any other liquid. Alan Steves46 10-22-2009 @ 10:27 PM reply profile send p.m. New Member Posts: 167 Joined: Oct 2009 Hi Andy. Although I only have a few years of experience with owning a flathead, I would like to offer a couple of things you may want to check. With regards to the back fire, running too lean can lead to overheating. Did the overheating occur after you changed anything on the car? More times than not, problem(s) can be traced back to the last thing you did. Are the wires connected good and tight on your ignition? Good luck and hope you find the cause and by-the-way, if you do, please share it with us. Pauls39 10-24-2009 @ 6:56 AM reply profile send p.m. Member Posts: 81 Joined: Oct 2009 Check your spark advance. The vacuum advance may have failed, the vacumm line may be cracked or plugged. Timeing that is retarded or too far advanced will cause your car to overheat. Set it per specs and be sure the vacumm advance works properly. Andy0812 05-21-2010 @ 7:28 AM reply profile send p.m. Member Posts: 7 Joined: Oct 2009 Hi Guys, Thanks for all the info. Unfortunately, I put the truck away for the winter without solving my overheating problem. The truck is out of storage and I'm back on the problem.I am starting by having the timing checked. I'll move on to the others suggestions as I go along. As a novice my "gut" tells me this is tied into the backfiring issue. This is frustrating to say the least. Stenny 05-21-2010 @ 8:58 AM reply profile send p.m. Member Posts: 15 Joined: Jan 2010 The advice so far is spot on. If you determine that your timing is correct, pumps are working and thermostats are open, you may have a bad head gasket or worse, a cracked block. With the engine idling and warm (but not overheating), take a look into the radiator. You should see the coolant moving and this indicates that at least one of the pumps is doing its job.If you see bubbles, the exhaust is finding its way into the coolant and you will need to address this. Pull the heads and read the gasket if possible to determine if there is a breach somewhere. Clean up the block deck to try and locate a crack (visually or better, with a magnaflux kit). If the block checks out good, make sure the heads are true, replace the gaskets and torque to spec. Run the engine up to normal temp and re-torque the heads after cool down. If this does not cure your problem, you may need to pull the engine and tear into it

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