Thermostat Questions

[E=MC²]

I posted a thread a few days ago about my car running cold. Really cold. Last night on the way to the Varsity I looked down and my car was under the C on my gauge and I was running 80 for the past 40 miles. So now I am going to get a new thermostat to see if that fixes the problem. I looked on autozone.com and it says OEM is 170 degrees but there are also 180 and 190.
With such a big radiator should I go up in temp rating? What will that exactly do for my car?

[blumagic04]

I would go with the 170 if you think your engine is running real cold.......

[E=MC²]

Well doesn't that mean the thermostat opens at 170? I thought that would mean I would go higher sense the car runs so cold.

[blumagic04]

You said u have a bigger radiator right, yeah it will open up at 170 but going with that u will see the gauge move. What kind of thermostat do u have in there right now?????

[E=MC²]

OEM never been changed sense I have owned the car.

[blumagic04]

Go with the 180 and see what happens
Trail and era type situation.......

[E=MC²]

Someone else chime in please i want more than one opinion

[STRteg]

I think you should go up higher in temp rating for the thermostat so that the heat has to be greater before it opens up properly what kind of radiator do you have?

[STRteg]

and are you running fans?

[Atlblkz06]

A higher degree Tstat will just open up later. When your AT 210 degrees, it doesn't matter which one you have.

Its not a big deal, just get the 170. I wouldn't lose sleep over this choice.

[E=MC²]

okay well i got the 180. i figured that i cant do to much damage going with the middle one. its a KOYO full size btw

[Elbow]

Do you have a temp gauge? Like a real temp readout? But yeah just get whatever and test they are cheap and not hard to install or anything...

[STRteg]

lmk how it goes with the 180

[Bpeterson]

is the temp gauge even working?????????could be a coolant temp sensor issue

[STRteg]

^^^yeah that too

[scttydb411]

i would recommend the 180 or 190. i wouldn't recommend 170 since as soon as it hit's 170 it'll be opening and trying to cool to 170. the ecu sees 170 as the cold/warm point. anything below 170 is in the cold range and adjusts fuel and timing enrichments. you'll be constantly switching from warm to cold start mode.

if it continues after replacing the thermostat try replacing the temp sensor.

[E=MC²]

okay thanks guys i changed it and it is doing alot better staying at a constant temp.

[STRteg]

you used the 180?

[csmiths]

it might not be your thermostat, it could be the temperature sending unit. but your thermostat could be stuck open which wont hurt anything, you just wont get good heat at all. and it would be almost impossible to over heat

check the sending unit, but turning on your heat, if its hot as hell then its probably the sending unit. or you could check the upper radiator hose to see if it gets hot. mine did the same thing all the time and it was the sending unit. now its all fine