My temperature needle stays just left of centre almost no matter what but on warm track days it goes up to about 75%. According to the ODB port it was reaching 112 deg C before I backed off. Just taking it easy for half a lap brings the temperature back down but not for long. This has been happening since I bought the car 18 months ago, but normally I only do tracks days in winter so it's not a problem. I recently swapped the temp sensor and flushed the coolant in case they were the issue. They were not. For a while I tried opening the windows fully and putting the heater on full and that seemed to work until the marshalls spotted the open windows and told me to close them. I don't mind buying an uprated radiator (suggestions?) but is there anything else I could try?
Steve, if turning the heater on makes it better, its got to be some of the tubes in the radiator blocked, you will need to remove it and really blast water through each way, or replace the radiator
do you have the standard rad fitted? I had exactly the same problem on track with an alloy aftermarket rad, I swapped back to a standard OEM one which sorted my problem.
Yeah, it's the OEM one in there at the moment. I might just get a new OEM one. Is it the Valeo one? Which rad did you have @sunnylunn ? So I know to avoid that.
Agree with everything said about the standard one being good enough I had a running hot issue....assumed I had a standard rad but found out it was a replacement....fitted a standard Valeo and no problem since
I have exactly the same issue, with a new rad fitted. Car is fine unless on a summer track day when temps rise to 3/4 on the temp gauge. Was the same with old rad and the new Valeo.
What kind of track do you run? Is it fast circuit or even Slalom in 2nd gear? Makes big difference. I do sometimes Slalom with pushing hard in 1st and 2nd gear up to the limiter. When outside temp is About 25-30°C, my coolant temp is about 110° when I get back to the paddock. I´m pretty sure that if you are running on fast ciurcuit in 4th....6th gear and higher speeds, the temp should stay at max.90°, maybe 85. I had for almost 2 years an faulty thermostat and my water temp was max. 70° even in summer. In winter, heating wasn´t able to get really warm inside. When I replaced the Thermostat (along with the timing belt) temp raised up to about 85° in steady state. Probably your thermostat is faulty. If you remove it completly ( make sure that you make no short to the small circulation, rather force the water to flow only in big circ.) you will see if your radiator has enough potential to cool the engine down. I assume that some suppliers offer thermostates with quicker opening. Usually, they open at around 88C.
I've replaced the thermostat with a new one - same result. I've seen this problem on warm track days at Bedford and Brands Hatch. Bedford is quite a high speed circuit, mostly 3rd and 4th gears, and a very long 5th gear straight. (I don't think you ever reach the limiter in 5th in my car.) I've got a new OEM radiator being fitted this week but I'm not on track again until the 23rd, so we'll see.
I´ll lay odds on your temp won´t change when you have replaced the radiator. As I´ve told, my temp was over almost 2 years not over 75°C even in summer, mostly at 70°. I talked to my dealer and he told that would be normal on RS cars due to the power, maybe to avoid pinging… BS. I was suspicious all the time about this statment. Then at easter I changed the thermostat to a new one with a refered opening temp of 83° ( most ones are 87-88°C). Since I have this operating, my temp is under normal conditions 85°, today it was very warm in Germany, it was 28° outside. My temp. was often in town Cycling at 98°. What I want to say: I´m pretty sure that your radiator is big enough to handle even the temps on the track. It´s all about the thermostat what is designed to keep temp under normal conditions in the 85-90° region. I think to remember that there are thermostats with reduced opening temps, maybe 75° or so. Maybe that the one I´ve removed was such an item, stupidly I´ve thougt it might be broken and I´ve scrapped it....but it was too low in temp. I think that the only downside of temps over 90° on the track will cause some power losses due to the ECUs reduction of spark advance or losses in charge pressure. 80-85° on the track would be perfect für max Output.
The new radiator has fixed it. I was at Brands yesterday, 27 deg and sunny, coolant never got above 98.
Steve I’m having the exact same problems as your describing , where did you get your new radiator from ? The radiator I’ve taken off the car is a little bit different to a oem part as the one I have currently only has 24 cooling ports compared to the Oem which nearly has double I’m hoping this will sort it but need to find where to get one from cheers Ross
Hi Ross, I actually bought mine from Renault. I probably paid about double what I should have but I wanted to be sure it was an OEM item. The situation is slightly confused because there are two OEM parts and I could not get a convincing explanation as to the difference. Incidentally I found that although the situation was improved with the new rad it wasn't completely fixed. I've since fitted a low temp stat and replaced all the coolant with de-ionised water and a water wetter (ie. no antifreeze). So far that has fixed it but I've only done about 30 laps at (a very warm) Snetterton since the switch. I saw a max of 99 degrees, about 10 degrees lower than previously.
I got mine from Mister Auto a couple of years ago. Cheap price and quick delivery and genuine Valeo part. I’ve got the part number somewhere......fitted straight in to my R26.R
Steve thank you every car parts place doesn’t seem to do them so I’m thinking I’m going to have to go genuine aswell got a couple more places to try supposed to going to Croft soon so hopefully I can find one before then
What radiator did you have fitted originally ? mine looks very good condition and has been tested and they say it’s fine but going off other peoples comments I’m wondering if my rad isn’t up to the job as it is different to a Oem one
Mine looked in good condition and no visible problems - but it got hot on a track day when I got the Valeo through it was clearly a different style than the one in the car. Same overall dimensions but cooling fins/bars very different Changed the thermostat at the same time although was a standard one, not the low temp one Steve suggests no overheating issues since
Well new radiator ordered should be here the next few days , also got a new thermostat to fit so hopefully all should be good what type coolant should I be using ? A quick search says type d ?
Adbett just received my new radiator from mister auto , but it’s exactly the same as the one I’ve taken out it looks nothing like What the original should can you help on what yours looked like ? I don’t think the one they have sent is a valeo one
mate, that sucks :-( If it stated it was a Valeo one then that's what they should have sent. Mine definitely had a Valeo label on it when it came Can't find any photos, sorry. Car is stored elsewhere but will try and get some pics tomorrow although it's hard to see much detail without taking the bumper etc off From memory the one I took out the car had fewer horizontal rails running across the radiator and the ones it did have were more circular than flat. The new Valeo had a much greater density of fins and rails and the rails were flat (like squashed tubes). The 2 rads looked very different although the same overall size and connecting points
Yes that’s exactly what this new one is like it has less cooling fins than a standard one so basically the same as the one I’ve taken out which I’m not really wanting, sent them a message so waiting to see what they say
@ross_225 did you try the rad or return it? Ive just waited a few weeks for a valeo rad to turn up and its the crap aftermarket style. Was expecting it to be as oem but not the case. Will run it for now and see how it fairs come summer
No I returned it with no problems , basically told them it wasn’t as described I managed to find a mint condition second hand on and have had no problems since
Fair play. Ive stuck this one on whilst waiting for a good used one to come up for sale, will hopefully be ok for road use.
