Engine temp too high (?) following damaged radiator

Hi,

Damaged my coolant radiator the other day, it's a bit bent and one of the mounts came off. I've been on a couple of journeys with it as it is and it seemed fine, engine temp at about 85-95 degrees, however on the way into work today it continued to climb and climb and reached 116. No warning lights came on so I rightly or wrongly carried on till this temp.
The past couple of days there has been a couple of little wet patches under the radiator, however the reservoir still looks reasonable, albeit maybe suprisingly so.

I can only imagine there is a block in the system? i.e. a pinched pipe in the radiator? That or the leak is worse than I thought PLUS the reservoir isn't feeding in.
At lunch time I'm going to go check the radiator is full of coolant. Is there any way to do a flow test? A fan test? Any other checks I can make?

Cheers.
Ian

[timwilky]

Ouch that is getting far to high. Is your fan not switching in

Forgot to look but not noticed it, albeit I had my earplugs in. I'll run her up at lunchtime.

According to my manual the temp won't flicker' til 120degC or go 'HI' til over 130degC.
However the fan should come on at 98degC and off at 92degC. I'll check this and report back.

Weird, managed to get to and from work without going above 91degC so never got to see the fan kick in if the above is correct. I guess from the damage done to the rad I must have had a blocked/pinched pipe for the journey?
Anyway I've got a new rad on order so I'll swap it out when it arrives! Cheers.

[yorkie_chris]

If it is leaking and level drops below fan switch then fan will not cut in.

Reservoir level tells you nothing you need to look in rad and top that up. (do cold only or get superheated steam in the face)

Another option being that the fan operation could be obstructed by the bent rad but more than likely coolant level as it is leaking

[yorkie_chris]

Good point. You can short the fan switch terminals together with bit of wire (briefly) to check fan goes round and is not blocked by bent rad.

Hello! Yeah I checked the coolant level in the rad yesterday and it was full to the brim. I also checked the fan was free by spinning it by hand through the grate and it was ok.

I didn't check the fan was running as I never got abover 91degC and I don't think it cuts in until 98degc? I'll try and remember to look tonight?

So as the temp remained ok I'm assuming there was a temporary flow problem maybe due to the bent rad. I've a new one on route now so hopefully I won't experience the issue again once replaced.

[timwilky]

just let it tick over for 10 mins, keep an eye on the temperature. check it cuts in

Hey cheers for the advice.

Replaced the radiator today with one ordered from http://www.delkevic.co.uk/ for £146ish. Arrived next day.

Fitted perfectly.

Found that the top left water hose inlet was crushed so possibly accountable for the slight leak. Also the radiator looked far more damaged from the back, much more kinked so their may have been some flow problems.
Just need to replace the inlet hose above as I discovered a pin-***** leak in it.

Cheers again.