CobraStangGT16

Yeah, so it was super hot out, like 98*F and it was stop-and-go traffic for about 45 minutes. I had my windows up and AC on, cuz I was dying in there. It finally opened up, and I just took off. After driving for about 3-4 minutes, I looked in my rear view mirror and I see white smoke coming from behind my car?!?!

I quickly slap on the hazards, and pull to the shoulder, hop out, open the hood and see whats up. There was coolant EVERYWHERE. All over my valve covers, battery, overflow tank, pulleys, PS reservoir, EVERYTHING...It was all brown and sludgelike too.

So I call my dad, he says just sit and wait until it cools down, and start her up. So he calls back 10 minutes later to see how I'm doing, and as I was telling him how close I was to cars doin 80mph, my phone hangs up and dies. I have no charger with me, and I could only imagine what my dad thought happened to me.

I jumped out, ran my *** all the way to the nearest Call Box, have the operator call up my dad, and he was already halfway there towards me. He gets here, and opens the reservoir, and I have NO ****ING COOLANT IN THERE!!! 30 seconds later, and I would have had a blown head gasket. He brought some 50/50, and poured it in, and he drove it home just in case. All's well, but it freaked me out knowing that just a couple seconds later and my car would have been toast. Sorry for a stupid post, but I needed to vent a little.

EDIT!: Can I buy alower temp. thermostat? Would it help with overheating?

Shawn02GT

im guessing that you just had too little coolant and on a hot day in stop/go traffic with AC that just overloaded the system

jpmustanggt

Scary man, no more stop and go traffic!

AJ06GT

I don't like the sound of the brown coolant... you sure you didn't already blow the head gasket?

CobraStangGT16

Tell me about it....Yeah Shawn thats exactlywhat happened.Hot day + Traffic + AC + Low Coolant = One seriously overheated pony!!!

AJ, I'm pretty sure, because my car wouldn't really be running right. All coolant comes our brown. The Ford factory puts a special solution in the cooling system that lines the walls of the engine and radiator and hoses that keeps it from rusting. That enamel is a murky brown color, and no matter how many times you flush the system, it will stay brown. My levels got so low, that the enamel was being burned off the engine and mixed with the antifreeze, thus I get brown coolant.

I'm going to flush the system this week, and check all my other fluids. I'm racing next weekend at a road course and everything needs to be in tip-top shape!

beastzilla02

i never turn the AC on i just put the top down or roll down the windows =]

mvr

wow sounds like an adventure, thats why i keep a charger in the car... never know.

i noticed my coolent was very low a few weeks back [:@] good thing i cought it.

also, i have never turned on the a/c in my stang.

CobraStangGT16

How do you guys never use your AC? Where do you live? I dunno about you guys, but SoCal is notorious for people getting heat stroke in cars. And rolling the windows down is no good, 1) The air coming in is just as hot, 2) where I live, it's not safe to have your passenger side window down for car jackers. It happens alot.

I need AC!!!!

AJ06GT

You could certainly drive a car still with a blown head gasket depending on how bad it is. If it's not completely blown out you could just be leaking a little. As for your coolant... I don't know about all coolant being brown, mine certainly isn't, however, having never had my coolant level so low, I can't personally attest to what it may look like if that were the case. I'll take your word regarding the enamel coating inside the engine and radiator since I don't know either way because I've never had a chance to get into this engine like that. I certainly hope that that's only the case, but I'd definitely do a coolant system flush and see what the coolant looks like after driving for a couple of days. The coolant definitely shouldn't turn brown immediately, however even if you were leaking oil into your coolant, if it was leaking fast enough to actually turn your oil brown that fast, you're right, it probably wouldn't be running right now. Usually if you get oil in your coolant you wont notice the color change drastically with a small amount, but you can dip your finger in and feel if there's oil in the coolant. Either way, best of luck. I hope you escape with the engine unharmed. It sounds like you caught it in time.

mvr

hey now, i lived in phoenix for almost a year and i only turned on the a/c (i had a ford contour) about a hand full of times. and it obviously gets very hot sertain times of the year.