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It can be done in around an hour (or so..)with a replacement thermostat and tools all ready on hand. Just DIM (Did It Myself!)last night for my 1999 2.3 lpt 4 cylinder during our East Coast winter warm spell. My thermostat was sticking open and lowering the available cabin heat. I found an 89 degree Celcius replacement thermostat and rubber gasket for about $10 at an import parts store. It's probably best to get one with the same little bleeder valve thingee in the thermostat disc that always allows a trickle of water through when the thermostat is closed. I'm not sure why, but I heard this advice elsewhere and I'm not certain if the Stant replacement I first looked at had one. Drain down about a gallon of the coolant (and save for re-use if not doing a flush and coolant replacement...) first with the drain cock located at the lower left corner of the radiator. A little WD40 on the plastic valve body slot makes it turn more easily if it has likely gotten stuck and to avoid breaking off the thumbturn with the pliers you'll probably resort to. It's sort of a turn and pullout motion. The drain empties directly down through a frame member.
Since the thermostat housing is at the upper left rear corner of the engine (just follow the big hose from the radiator top left) it shares some space with an electrical wiring connector mounting bracket, so you need to be careful not to stress these connectors and wiring while accessing the thermostat housing. There are two smaller (10 mm?) hex head bolts that attach a grounding wire to the housing with one bolt and some lower bracket for a hose below the housing with the other 10 mm bolt. The housing is actually bolted to the cylinder head with (2) 13mm hex head bolts. Not much space to do the wrenching (It's a Saab, remember..!!) but a tryout with small socket handles and short extensions and combination wrenches can get it done. You might have to tap on the wrench handle to get the bolt started. I was tempted to remove the air intake piping to the throttle body to get more working room, but got the bolts off and on with some patience. Perhaps removing the radiator hose from the thermostat housing would be helpful, but I didn't want to mess with the factory hose clamp and wrestling the hose off. It's flexible enough to not cause problems with moving the unbolted thermostat housing.
My bad thermostat had markings indicating "TOP" near the bleeder thingee, so I installed the new thermostat in the same orientation. The gasket actually goes on the thermostat first and just stretches over and covers the outer rim of the thermostat body. A little RTV silicone gasket maker on the thermostat housing ensures a leak free installation as you bolt it over the replaced thermostat and to the cylinder head. The remaining smaller bolts re-attach the ground wire and lower bracket. Slowly pour the drained coolant back into the radiator overflow tank (with a funnel) as the displaced air bubbles up and screw the pressurized overflow cap back on. Start the car up, check for any water leak and you should then see the engine temperature guage slowly rise up and stay at the midpoint and your cabin heating returned to toasty warm!!
posted by 169.253....
, Tue, 4 Jan 2005 21:26:34
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