hi guys, recently my car overheated - I think it was something to do with the temperature regulator thingy. Now I need to get my master cylinder and gaskets replaced. The mechanic is going to disable the temperature regulator thingy since 'it isn’t" needed in southern Africa. Is this true? How does my car know when to 'drink" water??? I don’t want to buy a new master cylinder. It is already costing at least $1500 plus!
Thanks
Seana
I’m guessing it’s the termostat that he’s ‘disabling’ (by removing). And he’s wrong, all cars need thermostats, they’re not very expensive, find a source for parts and order one.
I’m guessing that Texases is right (as usual) about the “temperature regulator thingy”, and that the "master cylinder and gaskets) is probably the headgasket. It’s entirely possible that there is a communication/translation difficulty messing up the terminology. It’s even possible that they actually use totally different terms, like the English do.
Your car doesn’t know when to “drink” water. The cooling system is a closed system, with basically a radiator, a thermostat, and a water pump. When the engine reaches full operating temperature, the thermostat should be fully opened and allow th epump to pump the coolant through the engine where it picks up heat and into the radiator where it dissipates it. The thermostat prevents full flow of the coolant until it reaches full temperature.
Full temperature is typically in excess of 200F. Unless the ambient temperature where you are reaches over 200F, your engine needs the T-stat to reach proper operating temp.