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Dan Keller
Dodge Dakota
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4/09/2003
19:35:36

Subject: Did I damage my engine?
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So i moved to Montana from California... pulling an extremely loaded and heavy 6X12' Uhaul trailer. A few weeks before my move i installed a RobertShaw 180 deg thermostat in my 4.7ltr's cooling system. However, halfway through my trip (somewhere in Nevada) my thermostat stuck wide opened (my dumb luck). Not so bad in the summer months, but it was 18 deg outside, and roughly 40 inside the truck. was a very chilly trip. When i arrived here, i put the old thermostat back in... fixed the problem.

My question is, my engine's temp needle was pegged as low as it could go, and i pulled that trailer about 800 miles up grades and such with the engine running ice cold. I know it's not good to run an engine cold due to increased friction of its internals. I do however use Mobil 1 synthetics.. so i'm hoping that might have helped a little. Engine isn't exhibiting any strange behavior at all.. i'm just thinking long term affects here.

Any insight on this topic would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
dan
'01 4x4 4.7



mjhipp
Dodge Dakota
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4/09/2003
23:06:39

RE: Did I damage my engine?
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Could be a broken gague?



knowitall
Dodge Dakota
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4/10/2003
00:07:45

RE: Did I damage my engine?
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mjhipp, don't let the door hit your azz on the way out, ya tool.

Dan, I doubt it did much harm, certainly not as much as if it stuck closed. I think you got lucky on this one. If it was 40 inside the cab and you had a bit of defrosting action going on I'd think your motor is fine. Don't worry, be happy.



dickie
Dodge Dakota
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4/10/2003
06:47:56

RE: Did I damage my engine?
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Dan,
Don't worry about the little trip you took with the temp guage on low and thermostat stuck. I bought my 2000 dakota brand new and drove it probably about 8000 miles (maybe more) and the dumbass's at the dodge factory forgot to put a thermostat in. Hell I bought the truck in July and drove it thinking man this thing runs cool and gets cold A/C, and then when winter hit I was driving the truck for 30 minutes before the truck would get mildly warm. I took it to Dodge and they told me the factory forgot to put a thermostat in, at least that what it says on my service reciept. I know this had to do some damage like you said above about the engine not operating at its desired temperature, but I seriously doubt it did much damage to yours in that short trip compare to me. I now have 65K on mine.



rtdkota
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4/10/2003
10:14:37

RE: Did I damage my engine?
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If your PCM didn't throw a code-- too cold for too long**, then you were fine.. Motor probably did better-- A lot of people run 160 Degree T stats and get codes because they don't ever reach a good temp-- you had to be above that.

Sam



www.socaldakota.com

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