94 Subaru Impreza overheating

There's no formal FAQ for this group and any searche results would just depend on what your ISP keeps archived I guess. Likely not a lot. Do you 'smell' toasted marshmallow/sweet odor? That would be coolant. Is the coolant decreasing? (not just the level in the o'flow bottle - (carefully) check the radiator too. Any spots of leakage/drips?

There are some good posts and 'stickies' for soobs at

In general, unless these items have been serviced recently, you could have; air in coolant system, bad radiator cap, clogged overflow hose, leaking water pump, leaking hoses/heater core, leaking radiator, bad head gasket.

Getting/keeping air outta soob cooling systems can be tricky.

Thanks for reply Carl.

Quite right. The smell is similar to that smell you get when an engine boils - hot coolant. Doesn't seem to be losing coolant. When you remove radiator cap radiator is full to the brim and overflow bottle never falls below the low normal level. How would I know if there was an airlock in there somewhere? You can drive it 150km on the highway without the temp gauge rising above half way and with no apparent loss of coolant. When you stop the smell is normal. But drive 4 to 6 km from cold (especially in traffic) and then get out and the engine smells very hot. At this stage the fans still have not come on. If you let it idle for a while longer the fans do come on and then it seems to cool down a bit. I don't know what triggers the fans to come on but it seems to me they don't come on quickly enough in traffic and slow driving to keep the engine cool.

Regards Rob

I suppose the thermostat could be sticking, seems odd the gauge shows normal though.

Carl