no hot or cold air, overheating Cabriolet

[deego]

i have a mk2 golf gti cabriolet and have no hot or cold air blowing into vehicle would this effect it by making it overheat and stall like it is doing after half hour driving or is that something else plus the engine gets extremelly hot but fan attached to radiator does not kick in even after driving

[mobitune]

Don't drive your car until you get this looked at! It is a seperate and more serious problem! Overheating your engine can result in SERIOUS damage, including;

blown headgasket
warped cylinder head

in extreme cases it will also cause your engine to heat seize (as opposed to seizing due to lack of oil)

Your post is a little vague, is the cabin heater fan not operating at all, or is it just not blowing warm air/cooled aircon'd air?

If it is blowing air, but it isn't warm on the warm setting then I would suspect either a blockage in the cooling system, an airlock or low/zero coolant level. This would also tie in with it overheating and stalling.

Have a garage look at this immediately! If you are any way mechanically minded you could possibly bridge the temperature sensor for the cooling fan if you need to drive the car through heavy traffic to a garage, however I am not 100% sure on the layout of the mk2 gti's electrics so this may not even be possible.

If there is a blockage in the cooling system, air lock or low coolant level this solution will be of no benefit, even though it does cause the fan to operate.

Note that on some vehicles, doing this will cause the fan to come on even with the ignition turned off, so keep fingers and other loose objects (errr...) out of the way of the fan.

[onzarob]

i have a mk2 golf gti cabriolet and have no hot or cold air blowing into vehicle would this effect it by making it overheat and stall like it is doing after half hour driving or is that something else plus the engine gets extremelly hot but fan attached to radiator does not kick in even after driving

If that a picture of your car then is a MK1 cabriolet;)

there never was a Mk2..they just manufactured the MK1 cab until 1992.

The overheating issue could be a blocked/stuck thermostat or a faulty water pump.

How are you diagnosing its over heating, on My cab the fan used to come on about 3/4's on the temp dial.

There is also an issue where the earth wire on the rocker cover breaks and the temp gauge goes wild.

Let us know some more details.

[deego]

reg mk1 golf 1st there is no air blowing into car at all and regarding the overheating its more a case of the will stall after half hour or so continuous driving leave it a while and she is fine but engine is seems a little too hot when this happens
(fan on radiator does not kick in either)

[onzarob]

do you have the heater control moved to the on position, also check that the heater valve is moving(prone to fail)

I assume the water level is good (do not check when hot)

check the fan actually works and the switch on the side of the radiator hasn't failed( they do often)

Does the Temp gauge go high, if not then is probably not over heating, it more likely a failing coil/spark plug electrical problem.

You need to try an isolate what is happening, but elimination as failing to restart once hot has a number of issues like to it, there is a cold start relay/actuator which can cause similar issue as well.

Its Patience game to fault find but if you work systematically you will get there.

you sat the blower isn't running that could be earth or a fuse problem,the fuse board is in the passenger foot well, check that is not wet/corroded as this may cause all sort of electrical issues.

[deego]

cheers driving me nuts and garages seem golf dumb around here luv car too much to give up now only its only had 2 previous owners

[mr brightside]

hello, i can't be sure but i suspect your headgasket may be gone. the overheating is caused by a loss of cooling water flow due to the cooling system itself getting airlocked by combustion gasses from the engine. the loss of flow would also result in no water to the heater matrix and keep the fan thermoswitch permanently surrounded by warm or lukewarm water. take it to a VW specialist and ask them to do a compression test on the engine, in the meantime if it overheats again check for airlocks in the top hose once it's cool enough. once again this is only best guess,good luck!

[onzarob]

hello, i can't be sure but i suspect your headgasket may be gone. the overheating is caused by a loss of cooling water flow due to the cooling system itself getting airlocked by combustion gasses from the engine. the loss of flow would also result in no water to the heater matrix and keep the fan thermoswitch permanently surrounded by warm or lukewarm water. take it to a VW specialist and ask them to do a compression test on the engine, in the meantime if it overheats again check for airlocks in the top hose once it's cool enough. once again this is only best guess,good luck!


I'm not sure that the car is over heating, its just cuttingout which could be auxiliary air valve or warm up regulator.

Is the car loosing water? is there mayonnaise type substance under the oil cap? is there water in the oil?

lots of questions and i agree it would be best to take it to a specialist, nut don't give them too many clues just the symptoms, let them work it out.:D