dannodachef

Hello everyone,
This is my first time on this forum, I searched around a little and didn't see anything that really helped. I am sorry for the long story, but I am hoping someone out there can help.
My grandmother is old an no longer drives. She wants to give me her 92 5.0 convertable automaticthat my late grandfather bought her brand new off the show room floor. It is red,w/white leather and oly has 43xxx on it. The problem is that she lives in cali, and me in oregon about 14 hr drive away. I took a flight to see her and drive the car back home.
Well I got about 6 blocks away from her house and the throttle peddle gets stuck down. I shut the car off, pull over and look under the hood to see there is a broken piece on the throttle body. not the cable to the peddle but another black plastic piece that I assumed was the cruise control. I move it aside, start the car and everything seems fine so I continue. I get on the free way and within a few minutes I see the car is getting hot. I imdediately pull off the freeway and the car is dripping some coolant from the overflow. So walked to a parts store that just happened to be a block away (lucky me) and get a few tools, gasket seelant, and a thermostat. I also got a plastic gromet and a clip because once I got on the free way I noticed the car didn't shift correctly. I attach the the piece on the throttle body securely, then pulled out the old thermostat, and trying to be somewhat safe I just left theit out so there would be no restrictions in coolant flow.
I check for leaks and let it warm up. Seeing no other real issues I got back on the road.the temp gauge was half way when I got going and after a few minutes it goes up to between the top line before red and the line below it. Again I pull off the road and let it cool down thoughly.After this, I high tailed it back to my grandmothers house. On the way back the car never went above or into the red area, but it was not far away. I rented a car and went home because I had to get back to work. Sorry for the long story.

Does anyone have any thoughts??? I would still like to get a hold of this car, I its just I am far away. I would be greatful for any suggestions.

Thank you!

92GreyGT

Not to ask a stupid question but was it really that hot? The gauges in these cars are not known for their accuracy. Now that the thernostat is out I imagine that you have some air in there. I have a 92 and it is awful trying to get the air out. If you drive it some more the air may work its way out. When I fill the radiator I jack the front up as high as i can get it and either take the upper heater core hose or the EGR cooler hose off to get theair out.The piece on the throttle body was a bushing for the kick down. If you would have left that out then third gear clutches would have burnt up, so it's a good thing you got it back in there.

dannodachef

The car didn't act up in any other way, It didn't smoke or anything,I just took the gauge for what it said. I had a far ways to go I didn't want to take any chances. once I got the cable hooked back up the tranny ackednormal and shifting was smooth. but like I said the temp gauge went up to just below the top line before red, then didn't move. something just occured to me, I didn't ever hear a electric fan turn on. I didn't think about that at the time. hmmm.

92GreyGT

They have a belt driven clutch fan. I would try to get some air out of it. It's a tough thing to do sometimes. Good luck!

dannodachef

bump

any other thoughts??

MikeVa

How did the coolant look? Could be a blocked radiator or water pump going bad.
Was this car driven by your Grandmother at all?

djcondo

it could just be leaking out of the car behind the water pump. there is 2 gaskets there. the same thing was happening to me it would heat up but not go to the red so i changed all the gaskets on the front of my engine, put in a 180 thermostat, got a flex-a-lite fanand never had another problem. it runs nice and cool too.