Temp Needle Break Dancing.....

[OOMPH!]

My temp needle will be halfway, then it will jump up to the next line........then jump back down to the halfway line again, then back up again......etc etc etc. The needle doesn't move gradually it just jumps back and forth, but it hasn't over heated or got close to the red yet. Any ideas? Could my T-stat be going bad?

Thanks, George

[e30evolution]

you might have a lot of air in the system, and sometimes you car will register the tep of the air passing by the temp sensor, and sometimes the coolant.... if this is the case the motor will really be running much hotter than the temp guage reads.... look in the expansion tank while the needle is doing this and see if anything odd is happening

also check connections on the temp sensor and look for corosion.... if you have a volt meter open up the expansion tank and put one lead in the coolant and the other to a ground, if you have over .4v the coolant should be replaced..... basical;ly your coolant is acting like electrlite and your cooling system would be a battery.... this causes things to corode, and could make the temp sensor read incorrectly

[m42technic]

Tighten up the ground nut for the coolant temp gauge on the back of your cluster.

[bimmerphile]

Tighten up the ground nut for the coolant temp gauge on the back of your cluster.

[BavarianBimmer]

m42technic wrote:
Tighten up the ground nut for the coolant temp gauge on the back of your clust


I had the same problem and my temp needle jumps like a crazy junky when I drove over speed bumps the problem was solved by tightening the ground

[darien28]

same advise here as well...

take out your cluster and take off, clean, and re tighten the grounding nut.

[OOMPH!]

i'll try that and see if it works.......thanks guys