Ford Explorer wandering temp guage issue

105

Asked by retiredfornow Nov 21, 2007 at 08:55 PM about the 2006 Toyota Camry LE

Question type: Maintenance & Repair

Have a 95 Ford Explorer XLT with 4.0 V-6. Several months ago had the temp guage needle wandering up and down while driving. I changed the thermostat and seemed to fix it until yesterday when I noticed it doing it again. No leaking or noises anywhere and no overheating issues. 145000 miles on car and original water pump. The guage seems to creep up to normal temp when idling at a stop. Then when you accelerate from the light can see needle slowly creep down a quarter inch on the coolant temp guage. No operational problems. Car runs fine. Do I have another bad thermostat? Should I ignore it for now? Car warms up normally when cold in the morning and the temp guage doesnt start wandering until have driven several miles.  

3 Answers

yes,you could have a bad thermo,could be stuck half open,try another,if no change ,really no problem,could be a bad sending unit to guage,or a bad coolent temp sensor.this is located near thermo housing.j check where you put collent in plastic container,hot or cold, will say full cold full hot,just dont let it overheat.

1 people found this helpful.
83,795

I would suspect the coolant temp sensor. If the car is running fine and it is not showing an overheat condition, you can ignore it for now. I had an '84 Lincoln Town Car that did the exact same thing.

1 people found this helpful.

check your engine grounds. when you turn everything in does the temp go down? the engine is grounding through the gauges because it lost its ground. temp gauge is giving a false reading

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