ZX cooling/heater problem

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tarball
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Joined: 18 Dec 2002, 15:14
Location: United Kingdom
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ZX cooling/heater problem

Post by tarball »

Hi,
I have a '92 ZX 1.9TD, it has been running great for the past few weeks. Last week, I had been driving the car for 30 minutes when the air being blower out of the heater sudden went cold for about 5 minutes then back to normal. Yesterday when I drove home from work I was unable to get the heater to blow any warm air at all. Additionally, the engine temp rose to the last white tick on the gauge and stayed there where as previously it always stayed below the halfway mark?
Is this another case of air locks in the system? Bearing in mind that I only bought the car a month ago and apart from checking the water level I have not yet attempted to change the coolant, and for the first three weeks I have not had any problems.
Cheers for any help, Jason
RichardW
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Post by RichardW »

Cold heater + high temp means you have not enough water in the system. The question you have got to ask is where has it gone? Bubbles in the coolant, oil in the water/water in the oil, pressure in the system after the car has been standing. Head gasket problems. Might just be a leak somewhere (rads / heater matrices on ZX's are weak points - worth a check!).
Richard
sooty
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Post by sooty »

Did the fans start when the gauage reached just over half-way, if not, why ??? If you say it reached the top end of the scale, I think your gasket and cyl. head has been cooked.
If you are sure there are no problems with the gaskets, bubbles and etc. as stated by Richard W and if you are a lucky sod, then follow the procedure below to bleed the cooling system.
First you must have a container that fits the expansion filler neck snugly ie: a plastic container with some masking tape around its screwed cap neck in a tapered fashion, so that you can lightly push the container into the expansion filler without any water leaking when filled. Then height of the container should be approx 100mm higher than the system in including all three bleed screws.
One bleed screw is on top of the rad on the R/H looking at the engine, another is to right of the fuel filter/thermostat and the heater bleed is at rear L/H of the engine compartment on the end of hose like a blanking screw.
You can bleed all points, keeping the water level high. You can do this later again when the engine is warm, but be warned!!! if you are not careful you can get burn't with hot water if you fumble with the screws ( water system will be under pressure of approx 14lbs ).
The ZX has no heater valve, so it does'nt matter whether its turned on or not. The heater is controlled by flaps directing the air flow as required.
Sooty
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