1985 toyota 22r overheat

Here's a long shot: a friend had a similar problem with something about that year, tried everything, and turned out one of the coolant hoses had started to come apart on the inside and was blocking flow. An affordable fix if that's it and probably due anyway for new hoses if you haven't changed them already.

I changed hoses when I put the radiator back in.

I assume you changed the themostat with hoses and radiator? on an old mustang I have, the sending unit did this with the oil pressure. with an newer tbird, I had trouble with AIR in the coolant, causing circulation problems. and are you sure you got the same one back in it? I know some people took thermostats out, in old days, thinking overcome overheating, but it didn't i t makes it worse in HOT climates. that and the thermostat seemingly causes the water to circulate to less remote areas in the engine thus building up steam if it is not there?

Timing is easily checked, you know if you have a tool, but yeah too advanced to retarded can cause excessive heat, but both usually have other more important symptoms like knocking, or low power respectively. last think I have read in other forums is (not in toyota's particularly) plugged catalytic, but you should again have other symptoms (mpg way off normal) no power, or jet like sound.

akersa enlightened us with:

I did change the thermostat actually twice, because I thought that maybe I got a bad one. As far as the timing goes I have checked it with a light, and it is on the money, but I wonder if somehow the vaccum advance is messed up or something like that. It does not ping, and it has plenty of power. Any more Ideas?

Adam

Check to make sure it's really overheating. It isn't making the usuals signs like water usage, pinging or power loss. Check the gauge and sending unit.

I am sure that it is overheating, when the gauge goes up I stop the engine, and it is spraying water into the overflow tank, and I can tell that it is hot.

FWIW: Just recently went through the same thing (s) that you are going through with a 93 22RE. Did all the same troubleshooting and "some" of the same parts replacement. Finally did a recheck of the spark plugs and discovered that # 4 (in my case) was showing that the cylinder either wasn't firing or at least not firing properly. When all else failed to correct the problem, I pulled the head and discovered that there was a burned (read blown) spot at #4 gasket (again my case). Replaced the gasket (PITA) and reassembled the engine. Problem solved!! Runs cool again. Hate to reflect this but it was my fix! Compression check was good during the trouble shooting on all 4 cyl, so must have been a compression leak after the engine got hot!

Hope this is not your situation Bill BTW: If you have to pull the head,read my previous post(s) regarding the timing chain (or contact me direct>

Check the timing to see if it's not advanced too much. This would cause it to over heat. Good Luck......

Is there any chance you could of put the thermostat in backwards ?

No the thermostat is in correct. I too did a compression check, and it is good, and If I pull one spark plug wire off it makes a difference, so all the cylinders are running.

Adam

Reading through this thread I'd say you've gotten suggestions on all the probables and stated you've checked them. If all that fails then I'd guess you might have a blockage in radiator, since you said the rad. shop said it's bad. If you can borrow an infra-red thermometer or use a cooling system thermometer check temps along the cooling system path. If there's a blockage you will see a noticable, abrupt differance in temp at that point. You will see a gradual difference along the pathway on the radiator as the coolant is cooling as it moves down through the radiator but, it should change gradually. HTH, davidj92

Check to be sure you don't have a blown head gasket.

I'll second what was said about the radiator being blocked again. I know someone who put a new radiator(and cylinder head and waterpump and thermostat) in his Toyota

22R pickup and within one week it was partially blocked (the engine would overheat in traffic but not on the highway). His mechanic got him another new radiator and one week later same thing happened. Then he had Pep Boys do some kind of vacumn flush on the engine block and by that time he had to buy another car (he had to use it for work) and was selling the Toyota, still overheating. I was going to take his second new radiator to a radiator shop and have it rodded out to unblock it if that was necessary...but I couldn't get hold of him and then bought a different Toyota truck.

If I'd bought that one I would have flushed the engine block myself just to see how much crud/rust was in it. I asked a radiator shop owner if he'd ever seen an engine that couldn't be flushed successfully and he said that was very rare, wasn't sure he'd ever seen it happen.

What does the coolant look like, is it rusty colored?

The infrared thermometer sounds like a good way to check the radiator...I see them on eBay for $25-$50.

Good luck,

John