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sunike32
09-17-2008, 04:29 AM
I've noticed the truck doesn't seem to warm up very quickly...actually it takes forever. Tonight it was around 50 degrees out and was coming home from my brother's house. The ride home takes probably 20 minutes, maybe half of which is highway. By the time I pulled into my driveway, the temp gauge was barely at the first hash mark. Do you guys think the coolant temp sensor is junk? If so, could this affect the truck in any other way...I would think the computer seeing that read as "cold" for so long it would screw up other things?

I suppose the thermostat could be stuck open, but that would just take it longer to warm up right? Seems like even if the problem was just the thermostat being stuck open, the temperature would have still gone higher than the first mark on the gauge.

My truck is a '99 with no clutch fan...the E-fan installed now is less than stellar, but regardless it was off the entire ride home.

Any ideas?

Here is a pic. This is not my dash, just found the picture and added the yellow line roughly where mine was after the ride home.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v614/sunike32/dash.jpg

DobaMark
09-17-2008, 03:42 PM
I think the first step is to determine if the truck is reading cold or is actually cold. Does it make heat of you turn the heater on?

If the heater seems to work OK, the truck is probably warm enough but reading cold so you'd suspect a sensor problem.

If the heater is cool, then the truck is running cold and the thermostat is the only thing that's going to affect that.