Thermostat for 96 Nissan Maxima

Typically thermostat's fail stuck open, not closed..

In any case, if you follow the lower radiator hose on the passenger side of the engine bay, you'll see it turn up and into the block. That hose connects to the thermostat - so once you disconnect that hose, its

3 bolts (IIRC) to remove the thermostat housing (which contains the thermostat). IIRC, Nissan just sells the entire assembly, so just pick up a new assembly and new gasket and pop it on. Shouldn't take more than an hour or so. I would suggest draining the coolant from the radiator to minimize spills.

Cheers, Nirav

96 Max GLE, 122k

Whatever you do, do not run the car without a thermostat, because the water could go so fast through engine and radiator that it will not transfer the heat out, and the engine will overheat. My boss found that out when he thought his car would run cooler without thermostat (not).

A racing friend also discovered that when he cooked his motor. He has since learned that racers that remove the thermostat use a restrictor so coolant flows through at the proper rate.

PS: My 11 year old 95SE has never had cooling problems. I replaced all hoses and belts at 60,000 miles even though there was nothing in the manual about that, because nothing will ruin a hot day like a blown radiator or heater hose.

Interesting. I don't believe it, since it goes against laws of convective heat transfer. I think what happened is that after your boss and racer friend removed the thermostat they didn't adequately burp all the air out of the engine.

I concur. I have family in East Africa, and when we import american cars there, we just remove the thermostat. No point really in that climate. The cars always run fine.

CD