I have been having some issues bleeding the coolant on my wife's 2001 cavalier 2.2. Let me first start off with what was wrong.
The car was taking a long time to heat up and the heater took forever to heat the car. If you started the car and let it idle up to warm, it sometimes would drop back to to cool. The last thing it did before I deiced to tackle this problem was the coolant bottle began to overflow a couple of times, not a lot. Also, the coolant reservoir bottle cap was bad. I first decided to change the thermostat, I picked up a "failsafe" one from Advance Auto Parts. When I popped the thermostat, the engine was warm, not hot so I wouldn't burn my self. A lot of coolant came out, just a little more than a gallons worth. I filled up the coolant reservoir to the top and ran the car with the coolant reservoir cap off like I have read. This year does NOT have bleeder valves, it is a self-bleeding system. There is a small rubber line that comes off the top of the black metal coolant pipe that wraps across the front off the engine that plugs directly into the coolant reservoir. The GM dealer said I should rev the engine to get air pockets out. When the engine got up to normal temperature, I began revving the engine two different ways. I first tried the fast quick rev then the slow constant rev. While doing the slow rev, the coolant reservoir actually fills up and overflows. After doing each way, the upper driver side radiator hose always makes gulping noises which makes me think there is still air stuck in the system. When I contacted the GM dealer and several other mechanics they're first thoughts was the head gasket. I told them the car was running fine and wasn't using any antifreeze. Then they said it was probably air lock. They also told me to check the dipstick to make sure the oil wasn't milky. I checked it and it looks golden brown, no milky color. So I changed the thermostat again to a ACDelco to see if that would fix the problem, nope. Air is still stuck in the system and the car is still un-drivable because it overheats now. The car never overheated before I first changed the thermostat.
Am I suppose to continue to rev the car and constantly overflow the reservoir until the air pockets are out? Is there a special trick to this or is there a bigger problem? Any tips/trick would be great because we absolutely need her car for next week. Is there another way to check the head gasket? If it is the head gasket, what is the average repair cost?
Thanks,
Robert
A thermostat is not 100% necessary. If you absolutely need the car you can run it without the thermostat. Fail safe means that if the thermostat were to freeze it would only do so while open.
It will do essentually the same thing it did before you played with it. Take a while to warm, etc.
The whole over flowing thing, did you have too much in it?
I have the bottle up to the full line and I already changed the failsafe thermostat out for a ACDelco because I thought it may have been faulty. I'm not overly concerned about the thermostat right now, just how to get the air out because that is causing the car to now overheat which it never did before.
i too would like to kno more about how to fix this problem.
yeah, you want to burp that puppy out, also, there IS a bleed valve, on teh drivers side of the motor, down under the coil packs.
Use that, then jack up the passenger side of the car to elevate the resivoir even more, then run it. You will burp coolant out for a while most likely. then it will fall down, maybe even empty out the resivoir.
Keep adding when it falls, until there is no more evidence of air pockets.
does that bleeder exist on a 97 2.2? my coils are down under the intake manifold. i broke the bleeder screw that is at the front of the engine in that black metal tube.
Dustin Ouellette wrote:does that bleeder exist on a 97 2.2? my coils are down under the intake manifold. i broke the bleeder screw that is at the front of the engine in that black metal tube.
That's the only bleeder on this engine. I had the same problem getting air out after changing a thermostat. What
seemed to be the fix for me was a new cap from the dealership which was 18 psi instead of 15. It could just be that I screwed with bleeding it enough to finally get the air out.
As a side note, I noticed the overflowing seemed to be the worst when the weather was cold. These engines just have a crappy cooling system and they are terrible to purge.
2.2 97 Cavalier......the "Crapalier"
how much did that new cap cost you? when im driving, if i drive a constant 50mph or higher the temp gauge goes to about the middle...and then anything slower it approaches the top line but never crosses it. not sure if thats normal or not? it didnt do that before i replaced the head gasket.
Dustin Ouellette wrote:does that bleeder exist on a 97 2.2? my coils are down under the intake manifold. i broke the bleeder screw that is at the front of the engine in that black metal tube.
Well yeah, and no. There is no bleeder under your coil pack, as yours are on the back of the motor, but you have the bleeder on the drivers side metal coolant line (where the coils were relocated to on the 98+ style)
Well I'm not sure if the gm thermostat was the fix or if it was a matter of time before I got the air out. I also got a new reservoir cap and put that on later so that may have fixed the problem also. Whatever the case, the problem is now fixed and it was a pain. Thanks for all the help.
I have a 2002 cavalier 2200 SFI changed the water pump and the tharstat car still runs hot checked the oil and it isn't milky and someone broke my coolant blender screw any ideas I'm thinking it is air in my system fan works great put a used radiator on the car. Car only has 146k miles I hardly no anything about the car bought it 4 days ago
