Amazing overheating problem...desperate

nm9stheham said

Interesting.... lift caps are known to be more iffy than non-lift caps.....maybe just a POC 16 lb cap. Brand?

And 13 lbs would allow it to boil more easily. Perhaps the lift cap and lower pressure and drilled is allowing the system to bleed the air out better. And may be the temps are colder.....

A small head crack will sometimes show up a a slight but persistent overtemp. It can be very mild; I raced one for several races that way and the crack was so small that it never really got super hot, just up to the H range.

Well, here is hoping you have it fixed!

Click to expand...

Yes thanks, I switched to 13 lbs.lift cap and 180F stat...lowered the upper hose so that it was below radiator fill opening......so far, OK (fingers crossed) see posts below

A crack in the heads/block would be the death nell...I am just too old to be pulling and magnafluxing heads and blocks. I hate to get rid of a truck that is almost computer free and stripped down to the bone accessories wise. I ran a business for years and had about 15 or 20 of these 318 Dodge trucks and none were newer than 1990...they all ran over 200,000 miles and we abused the hell out of them. Average mileage at full failure time was 250,000 miles. All but one A727 trannys made it the whole way. They were always overloaded and we used 2nd gear, wide open throttle often to attain and maintain speed. The engines usually dropped a valve. I changed 2 radiators and had one right front suspension complete, just ripped out of the truck...The brakes lasted 150,000+ miles.

A Dodge 318 was a hell of a truck.