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Car Engine Going to Explode?
fforde
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Ok I am not sure how much help I will find here, but hopefully someone around here is an auto junkie. I drive a 95 Mazda MX-6, manual transmission 4-cylinder. I was driving home last night, and I notice my battery warning light comes on. I pull over shut my car off try to restart it, and it starts right up. It is raining pretty hard so I figure that it is a false indicator from the rain and I get back on the road. Then my engine temperature starts going up and up, to the point of almost redlining. When idling the rpms also fluctuate from 500 rpms (normal for idling) to about 1500 rpms. It is behaving as if I were repeatedly tapping the gas. I pull over again and check my fluids, my oil and antifreeze are both low. I add a quart of oil and top off my antifreeze. The battery was also slightly warm to the touch. Problem persists. To give you a little background just a day or two ago I had the starter replaced and a new clip for one of the battery cables put on. I drove about 80 miles before I started seeing these issues. Any ideas? To sum up:
* Battery warning light is on, but car starts up fine.
* As I drive the engine temp slowly climbs to redline.
* When idling, my rpms fluctuate.
* Battery warning light is on, but car starts up fine.
* As I drive the engine temp slowly climbs to redline.
* When idling, my rpms fluctuate.
fforde on
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Secondly, I would change your fluids out and look for improvement. If there is none, I would take it into the shop, but preferably not the same one you just visited and ask for a diagnosis.
If you trust him, ask your car guy when you take it in.
The low coolant level could be because of boil-over. The low oil could just be because you haven't changed it or checked it recently. Change the belt out, get a coolant flush and oil change, and see what happens. You're probably looking at a $350 bill or so for the whole deal, depending on the labor rate and other complications.
Shogun Streams Vidya
Make sure your fan is running, too. Sometimes fan motors can go bad but more often it's a simple, $5 relay that's easy to replace.
NEVER REMOVE THE CAP FROM A HOT RADIATOR. IT WILL KILL YOU, YOUR CAR, AND EVERYONE IN A 5 MILE RADIUS.
I have the 'heating up' problem you have, but that's just because my car has a slow leak in the radiator.
I'd feel the same way you might check with a mechanic. My previous car had a crazy idle sometimes so that's how I found out about the ICV. What kind of car is yours? If you can get an engine code.
Shogun Streams Vidya
There's a chance that the problem might be dirty or worn fuel injectors causing an inconsistent spray. You could try some fuel injector cleaner. It's less than $5 a bottle and shouldn't have any negative effects. If the fuel injectors are dirty, the cleaner should improve the problem noticably. Use another bottle in your next fill-up. If the injectors are worn, they'll need replaced. New injectors might also increase your gas mileage, if your old ones were worn out.
Good call on getting the pump replaced before your radiator boiled over, by the way.
My guess is something is wrong with getting water to your car in some way, as in gasket leak, hose issues, pump, radiator. Its a lot to check, so I reccomend a mech, and please, for your wallets sake, not a stealership.
Good luck!
Out of curiosity, what would cause a head gasket to go? Is there some kind of preventative maintenance that promotes long life of the head gasket (and the water pump for that mater).
Edit: Actually answer your question. Not really. You can flush and clean the cooling system out using stuff you can buy at the store. I usually do it at the start of summer to get all the rust and crap out of the cooling channels in the engine. I feel it helps. As for the water pump, you can't really maintance it. It's just a belt driven impeller. When they go, they go. The head gasket is a gasket that seals the block to the head. Or rather, the top to the bottom...kinda. That's not completly correct but it's good enough. A couple of different things can cause the head gasket to go. Overheating, detonation, various other factors. Overheating is the biggest one. My half sister blew her's twice because her car was overheating something fierce. It was awesome. A huge cloud of smoke and steam all over the place. It's all kind of tied to the overall health of the engine really. Like, my mom's water pump went out at about 100,000 miles for no reason but my crown vic has 216,000 miles and the only thing I've done is basic maintance. And I beat on that thing like you wouldn't believe. You'd really be suprised how much showing your car a lil love can do for it.