Question for the mechanics.

Ok I have a '92 mercury sable GS. It has a 6 cyl 3.0 L Engine and the temperature gauge is rising more than I'd like. I know that you normal running temp goes up when it's 95+ degrees outside but If I don't run my AC it runs at the normal temp. If I run the AC the heat starts crawling till it's almost at the O of NORMAL( normally rides at the M). I had a new radiator put on it when I bought it in January. The radiator has plenty of Antifreeze and water 50/50 mix. A couple of weeks ago it died cause it was to hot. I was in a parking garage and the stagnat air just killed it. I got it cooled down and then turned on the heater to full blast to pull the heat away from the engine while I drove it home. It seemed to raise when I was sitting at stoplights without the AC. I had the thermostat changed. Now it only gets hot when the AC is on and runs at normal temps when it's off. I guess my question is, is this normal or should I be looking for something else. Another thing I checked is to see if any of the hoses where collapsed and none of them felt that way.

<b>Agent</b> <b><font color=green>81</b></font color=green>

at highway speeds.

<b>Agent</b> <b><font color=green>81</b></font color=green>

Hello stranger! long time no see.

Is the thermostat the right way up, the radiator fan is running when it suppose too, nothing inside the engine water jackets blocking a passage or a hose collapsed internally, could be the water pump too, are you loosing coolant, got water in the engine oil ? (milky color indicates a head gasket), pull the plugs and see if one is clean and do a compression test or do a radiator pressure test.
The A/C is only adding to the problem with extra engine power required to run it.
If you don't want to tackle this yourself a radiator repairer can find the problem quickly, they will do a cooling system pressure test which finds 95% of the problems for a small charge.

I had a cleveland engine that kept overheating and it turned out to be a piece of additional casting that had lodged in a water jacket passage, damn weird and it took some time to find it.



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sounds like you are better off going to a radiator guy.

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yes, i figured it would be. I was hoping that there would be something obvious that I forgot to check.

<b>Agent</b> <b><font color=green>81</b></font color=green>

I'm not sure if the fan runs at all times, all I know is that everytime I've checked it's been running (of course I'd have no way of knowing at high speeds). When I was in high school we did a test with antifreeze to see what was the best mix. We found that with a 50/50 mix you get the best all around combination. So other mixes had a higher boiling point but the freezeing point was also higher. So I agree that 50/50 is best all around. It's been damn hot here so I'm starting to think maybe it's just supposed to run at that temp. I'm changing the antifreeze this weekend and if that doesn't solve it I'll just leave it alone till it overheats.

<b>Agent</b> <b><font color=green>81</b></font color=green>