I have an 89 Ford Aerostar with a 3.0 engine. The cooling system is giving me all kinds of headaches. It overheated, I think because of a thermostat gasket. At least that's where I found the stream of steam coming from. After replacing the gasket I now have a problem of running out of coolant. Right now I have completely removed the thermostat and running straight water until I can figure out what's causing the thing to keep overheating.
With the engine cold, I fill the radiator and put the radiator cap back on. I then drive the van three or four times, less than 10 miles each time, allowing it to cool down between each time. As expected, with the thermostat out, it stays very low on the temp gauge. The third or fourth time I drive it, the gauge will start to rise and quickly goes to 75% or higher up to 95% before I get back home and turn it off. When I go to fill the radiator again, it takes between 3/4 and 1-1/4 gallons.
I see no leaks anywhere, the oil system is not contaminated with water, and I don't see any steam clouds following me. I do seem to have a miss in the engine that wasn't there before so I replaced the spark plugs, cap/rotor/plug wires, which I needed to do anyway, and found a fouled plug in cylinder #6. This, however, did not fix the miss. Also, it seems like the miss is worse when the engine is "warmed-up" and at an idle.
I'm thinking it's a head gasket but could this be a water pump problem? I think my coolant recovery system is screwed up, too. I'm waiting on paycheck before I can do anything but if anyone has some thoughts I'd really appreciate hearing them.
TIA, BobW