papaindigo wrote:
before you get engine fully warmed up are both heater core hoses equally hot?
I checked this on my way home from work today and it felt like both hoses were warm, the one coming off the viscous heater was maybe a little warmer?? Strange because it was still blowing cold air in the cabin. It was ~25°F outside today. Also strange in that I was getting some warm air out of the vents after starting it and letting it idle for a few minutes, but as soon as I drove away (and VH heater turned off from higher RPM's?) it would get cold. Temp gauge also seemd to move around between 1 and 2 ticks below vertical after it warmed up. Maybe I have a bad thermostat and a plugged heater core?
I took an oil sample tonight and sent it in to the lab, will take a couple weeks before I hear back on that. I also went and checked-out the cooling system pressure tester again, I hooked it with a warm engine and pumped it up to ~16 psi. It only dropped ~2 psi over 30 min, which could partially be from the engine cooling down. Will try to check it again with a cold engine.
I've had a full coolant expansion tank for a few months (?) now so over the weekend I vented the pressure cap with a hot engine and let all the pressure out and then twisted the cap back on. It did fully draw all of the coolant from the expansion tank back into the reservoir that night, but purged it all back into the expansion tank on my way to work this morning.
This Jeep is my daily driver, so I will continue to drive it during troubleshooting unless there is a reason I should park it. I can park it, would just need to get my XJ out of storage.