had a C3 1982 crossfire for about a year, had it painted and now working on small things, it had been sitting for a few years in a garage under cover with 67k miles, owner before me had a ton of parts and was going to do a major job on it. all new suspension stuff, dcs intake manifold, rebuild kits for injectors, fuel filters fuel pump, sensors, distributor and cap, plugs, wires, sway bar, probably a few thousand in parts. he got sick and i got car, sunk 5K into a paint job, now working on rest of it.

hard part is finding things, not like a normal car. few nagging issues maybe someone can point in right direction

1. takes a long time to heat up, even in summer never gets to 180, usually 125 or so, thermostat is new, also oil temp is low so not gage or sensor. i suspect the cooling fan clutch but haven't gotten into it yet.

2. power antenna has a mind of its own in morning or after sitting. won't come up for about 10 min, then all of a sudden it comes up and then works good for rest of day until it is turned off for a while, power to relay from radio, took a while to find relay in jack compartment.

 

antenna can be rebuilt, or taken apart and lubed, does it get power to operate when the radio first comes on??(12 volts) ground good??? you need to check these possibilities before asking for help. IMO

WELCOME to the forum!!!

 

yep, has 12 volts to it, is like it is on a timer, 10 minutes and it decides to come on, after that it is ok, wiped down the mast when it was up with wd-40, up and down a few times, next day same thing, like a gremlin in there with a watch. haven't made it into the back yet, still messing with getting the instrument panel bulbs working right, had to put a new circuit board overlay on center cluster and connector does not line up correctly for the 12v and ground to the bulbs, i know the ground is ok because rest of the gauges that work on the same ground work so guess it is the top left wire on the connector because that is 12 and the top right is ground.

 

Look at the ground at the antenna mounting under the body in the back, it needs a ground there also, so the motor will work, it gets its 12 volts from the radio circuit (when it is on) .

 

Your new TS may be stuck open.

 

or your gauge is not accurate, use an IR gun to verify temperature.

 

will check, have a thermal imaging camera at work will borrow, but also seems low as the oil temp gauge is low. kind of doubt thermostats as this is 3rd one, i put 2 in and one was in it when i got it.

will check antenna ground tomorrow, have 12 volts to vehicle ground coming from radio, need to delv into antenna.

does anyone know about the fan clutch testing or diagnosing??? gonna take car out Thursday when weather warms up and drive to work and see for sure. Thanks to all for advice.

 

it would be the first c3 i heard about to run
that cold.

 

could it be the temp sensor that is in the block, did you wrap it with teflon tape???? if so, that could be your problem. The sensor has to be grounded to the block itself. Have you tested the sensor, or do you just keep replacing gauges??

 

never going to over heat, thats for sure. but it does warm up enough that it gets good heat. just not what it is supposed to be and the computer looks for a certain temperature in a certain time, to set the timing and mixture of the injectors,

 

never changed the gauges, just the thermostats, one was in it when i got the car, put new one and same thing, then another new one and same thing, so doubt 3 bad thermostats, gage should be close to correct because the oil temp gage is about the same, which tells me engine is not warming up as fast as it should, normally would not care but it sometimes causes idle to surge because the computer wants a preset temp to function correctly, there are 2 chips for the computer used, 160 and 180 i believe. taking a thermal imager home tonight to shoot the motor.

once it is warmed up good, idle is good, otherwise occasionally it surges some, guy who had it before me "adjusted the timing" some to compensate, but to correctly set the timing, there is a wire needs to be lifted, then the timing set, doubtful he did this so when i take the manifold off and put the new dcs one on will set everything by the book.

I still don't know if the cooling fan clutch is working right, seems like it is always full blast and not allowing it to warm up, had that on an old mustang once

 

I think the fan operation is by air going across it(the clutch) from the radiator, like when you get going down the highway, it goes slower by the temperature clutch loosing grip, since is getting cooler air blowing from the flight of the car, if you have all the gaskets around the radiator(very important here for correct cooling), and spoiler working to help, it should spin full force when car is sitting still(if I understand the operation correctly). Hope I am right here!


OK, I guess your new car fan works differently than my older car does, disregard my post here.

 

Actually looking at factory manual now, says there is a silicone liquid in the clutch that when hot or cold has different characteristics and couples the fan blade to the clutch, few ways to check it, then there are also AUX electric fans in front of the radiator?? have to check them and see if they are always on, and will unplug to test. hard to see anything in the front, took me a week to find the horns

 

Your fan is working because your not over heating. Also, your fan cannot over cool the engine. Your TS controls the engine temp in conjunction with the rad and fan. You say your engine does get warm but it takes longer to warm up. By warm up, do you mean it does reach normal temp of 160 or 180 after running for a while?

 

on a side note fixed the center gauge cluster lights not working, found the new printed circuit overlay did not line up correctly with the contact on the plug, little adjusting and now they work.

Want to fix the cooling problem, and poke around with the power antenna problem.

Then change out the manifold, replace leaking valve cover gaskets and general tune up. just changed transmission fluid and filter last week.

 

but my thinking is that it is not allowing it to warm up enough in the time it is supposed to. Seems to get to a normal temp, although I would say definitely not 180 or 160, maybe somewhere around 150 or so, will know better when i do a IR check on it.
The aux cooling fans are not supposed to come on till needed, if they are on all the time, will over cool, just as having a fan clutch that is solid.

Only other problems i ever saw like that were cars with no thermostat but they would never heat up, this one just takes to me an excessive amount of time and the computer doesn't like that so that causes problems with surging at idle when cold. After it is warmed up, then it will idle all day. Makes me wish it was just a standard V8 with no computer and just a carb, but it is what it is, and for the most part it runs great and even the gas mileage is not bad.

 

OK, update here, brought thermal gun home and shot car after about 20 min of running, water pump housing about 170F, heater hoses about 160F, so that tells me it is heating up but the gage still reads about 140 maybe, and the oil temp gage reads 110. Can 2 gages be bad or 2 sending units? Have to look at wiring diagram, and see where sensors come from. There are also calibration resistors on back of gages too. Think I will replace the water temp sending unit as it is easiest, versus ripping out dash. Here are pictures of thermal imaging. This is making me crazy, any ideas