Bongo Fury

hell my memories not that good, ours is green with a private plate on N999***.also has a bike rack on the back

LOL mines not too good either.
probably the green one then

Mountain wrote:I'm still not happy with the temperature rising towards the H mark in heavy traffic and steep hills as it makes me very nervous.

hi
have you checked the head flow port is clean,really clean.this is the opening in the top of the stat housing,the stat top disc shuts it when top end temps are approached.

if your getting high temps in traffic and up hills,airflow through the rad is not enough to cool the motor so the stat takes over the job and shuts this port and diverts full coolant flow through the engine and dumps the heat into the rad/coolant.if this fails to cool it enough then the first stage fans come on.

ady

Yes, it was clean. Well looked clean and felt clean....

The fans only occasionaly come on these days.
They kick in when my extra top hose sensor is around 87C and the modified temp gauge is about 90%.

However, after it gets hot it does take quite a while to cool down again.

This again would point to an inefficient radiator...would it?

short answer is probably yes.when the fans come on it should really bang the temp down quickly!! seconds.
have you changed/cleaned the fan switch and temp sender?
i replaced mine with non gen items and found the new readings from them were poor,they were not as accurate,replaced them with gen mazda,they were more responsive and imo more accurate.if you suspect the gauge is out i have a replacement you can try if needed,just to test.
the temp and fan switch are really critical in the operation of the system as they comm with the ecu to control temps,i have found that after head boil they tend to read wonky and imo should be dumped.

Thanks, it would be good to test before I replace them as I was considering changing those too. Will PM when I'm home from work!

BTW where is the rad fan switch?

Rad fan switch/sensor is the one in the drivers side of the rear of the block above the outlet to the heaters.

the ones you have in now (will test ok) as they are working,the important bit is at what temp are they working?hense your pos problem!!

Yep, my last car was a turbo diesel and started doing odd things, revving up while idling etc. I tracked that down to the temp sender....it was faulty and confusing the ECU.

Fans came on this morning and yet again it took several minutes for the temp to drop. Probably 5mins. So it is definitely looking like the rad is not doing it's job. I think in every vehicle I've owned, when you hear the fans kick in you see the temp needle drop.

I now have to explain to my wife, I need a new radiator & sensors....after all the money so far(some of it was her savings) She's going to kill me