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Losing coolant, oil and coolant temps seem high, ?

1K views 3 replies 3 participants last post by  RollinEarly99 
#1 ·
04 Excursion with the 6.0. I use a scan gauge II to monitor my vitals.

When unloaded everything stays pretty normal, but even small loads (I had maybe 1000 lbs of cargo in the back and a canoe on the roof on an 80 degree day last weekend) going out I-68 through Maryland, there are 7% or steeper grades that last 5-10 miles. If I have the AC on I see oil temps rise to 220 or even 225 and I see my coolant temps rising to 215, even 220. Turning the AC off seems to help a good bit, and both temps stay under 210 but even that seems pretty hot. Turning "tow/haul" off also keeps temps lower, though I don't know why. I've read that from other forums as well.

Now, if I hook my big trailer up (which weighs around 8-9k with my play truck on it) and do the same hills, even with the AC off I see oil and coolant temps around 230... way too high. And this is not screaming up hills at 70, thats slowing down to 40 mpg or so and trying to take it easy on my truck. When I'm loaded like that I'm probably close to 18,000 lbs so I know its a lot of weight, but I see other 6.0's pulling fifth wheel and goose neck trailers that have to be over 20k on the same hills and they don't seem to be overheating (or maybe since the factory dummy gauge doesn't go into "H" they are just blissfully unaware?)

My wife says she hears a sound that sounds like "cartoon bubbles popping" from the passenger side when temps get high (engine oil around 220, ect around 210 is when she starts hearing it), but I cannot hear it from the drivers seat, even with the radio off and etc. I suspect this is when my coolant is puking out of my degas bottle, but that is right in front of the drivers seat so that wouldn't make sense as to why she hears it when I can't. There are signs of coolant puke in the engine bay when the truck gets that warm. Generally seems like I lose about 12-24 ounces of coolant on a trip over the hills. I flushed my coolant until the distilled water was coming out clear the summer I bought the truck, which was about 2 or 3 years ago. The coolant that was in there was dirty. When I'm not towing my ECT/EOT delta is never more than 15, but with the AC on, on a 90 degree day, its not unusual for it to be near 10, especially when going up hills.

Its behaved like this since I've had it (bought it with 59k on it and it now has 105k). There has never been oil in the coolant or vice versa. When I'm not towing or hauling anything and its not an unusally cold day, the truck usually likes to run around 190 degrees and the oil temps usually 190-199. Even with my big trailer if I'm just driving around town temps never get higher than the low 200's.

And, if this helps, it seems to me that if I just drive around town for a month and don't tow anything and never get the truck really hot, it doesn't look like its puking coolant, but I'll still be down on coolant like 12-16 ounces every 4-6 weeks.

Thanks for the help.
 
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#2 ·
Just a thought, but maybe your thermostat isn't opening all the way. How is your fan clutch? Might be worth looking into also. Do you hear the fan come on when the temps start to get high?
 
#3 ·
Have you replaced the Degas cap yet? $6-$10. The old ones are known to leak. Are you overfilling the degas bottle?

Driving at low speeds will almost never heat up over 190. You may need to pressure test your coolant system or check your pressure when accelerating.
 
#4 ·
Good point twoiceburgs... The coolant has a updated mark that's supossed to have a stick on it showing the new max and min levels. Does your truck have that? When the truck is cold the add mark is really the full mark when going by the molded words " add" on the degas bottle.
 
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