A healthy radiator is essential for your GMC, as its job is to remove heat from your engine. Combustion and the movement of hundreds of components generate large amounts of heat. If your engine gets too hot, it can suffer serious, even fatal damage. As your GMC dealer, we want to tell you about some signs you need to visit us for a radiator repair.
Leaking Coolant
Liquid coolant is a mixture of antifreeze and water, and it absorbs heat. As it moves through your engine, it collects the heat and transports it to the radiator. When the coolant enters the radiator, it’s diverted into rows of thin aluminum tubes. Air flows in through the grille and cools the hot fluid in the tubes. Once the coolant has cooled, it circulates through your engine again.
Coolant is available in bright colors like pink, blue, yellow, and green, which makes a leak easy to spot. If your engine is leaking coolant, the pressure in the cooling system will drop. As the pressure in the system drops, the remaining coolant will move slower, and the cooling system will fail. Our technicians will trace the source of the leak and permanently seal it to fix this problem.
Damaged Radiator Fan
The radiator fan is attached to the rear of the radiator. When you’re driving, heat is removed from the coolant by fast-moving air entering through the radiator grille. If you’re driving slowly, stuck in gridlock, or idling, airflow into your engine is greatly reduced. In these situations, the radiator fan will switch on and blow across the back of the radiator tubes to force the hot air out through the grille.
A radiator fan can fail due to age, but it can also fail due to damaged wiring or a blown fuse. If the fan isn’t working, and airflow is insufficient to cool the hot coolant, your engine will start overheating. We’ll examine the fan and identify the cause of the problem. Depending on the situation, we’ll repair the problem or replace the fan.
Jammed Thermostat
The thermostat controls the release of coolant. The thermostat opens and releases coolant when the engine temperature reaches a predetermined temperature. The released coolant is pumped through the engine at high speed to remove excess heat and maintain an efficient operating temperature.
A thermostat is a relatively simple mechanism, but it can jam. If this happens, it will release too much coolant or no coolant at all. Too much coolant will drastically lower the engine’s operating temperature, and the engine will use more gas. If no coolant is released, your engine will overheat. We will fix this problem by replacing the jammed thermostat.
If your engine is running too hot, call us right away at Earnhardt Buick GMC.
Connect with us
