Missfire when hot

[Alex87]

Hello from Québec to everyone!

I own a 2wd 87 manual van since almost 2 years now, I am 25 years old and trying to figure some things out. Love the van!

Yesterday I got pulled over because of the rust.. and I have windshield, handbrake and rust job to do, but I wonder if it is worth to put that time and money in considering others problems.

When it is hot in the summer, sometimes temperatures go up near the danger zone.. and when I shut it off to put some gas or eat a poutine, it missfire for a couple of time and then is ok. It is thankfully not a problem in the winter because it is cold here so the temperature don't even go halfway up. I noticed that im loosing quite a bit of oil though, even if it's cold. I am not loosing a lot of coolant, maybe added some twice since I have it and I did around 30k miles since then, no pools of coolant on the ground. I have to confess, I did push the van with kayaks on the tops and big hills sometimes, nothing above 70 mph though.

Am I in big trouble with head gasket haha. It is my biggest concern but im sure there is a lot to check before that... Also I kinda messed up the connections of the coolant reservoir when I changed the alternator, kinda new to all this like I said but trying my best to understand.

Wondering if my problem rings some bells to anyone.

Would be willing to repair it to go climbing in Nevada next fall and also to keep it (kinda my house)

Thanks a lot for the time that you took reading this :D

[Jan-Willem]

If the van is hot, and you shut it down. The engine is still in the middle of the van, and it has very little means of cooling down. The engine bay, including everything in it will get very hot. The fuel will start to boil, and it will be hard to start because it doesn't have any liquid fuel in the lines to drink.
If you search for 'hot soak' you will find some references to a change/recall in the fuel system, that increases fuel pressure a little bit, to lessen the issue. Personally I like it better if there is any method to actually cool the engine bay when shut down. For one, the high temperature is not good for anything rubber and plastic in the engine bay, and also the interior of the van (well mostly the front seats) get quite hot. When the engine bay is cooled for a while after shutdown, all of these issues will magically disappear.

About it running hot in the first place, in my limited experience with the van, and other oldtimers: Car radiators do not last forever. Maybe if everyone that owned the vehicle was extremely diligent in changing coolant, or maybe if it has always ran waterless coolant, a radiator could theoretically last forever... Anyway a car radiator loses cooling capacity, even if it is not leaking (yet). Copper and aluminium, it all corrodes when it comes in to contact with water, especially when it is hot. Also the coolant system does not have a filter, so all of the crud, eventually collects in the radiator.
My experience is of course anecdotal, but on all of my oldtimers I have had cooling issues with the old radiator, and on none of them I have had cooling issues, after replacing or re-coring the radiator.

[Toyvan85]

Dear Alex

I have a 86 Van, for a verry long time (from 2005).

I also got some head gasket blowed, and i would like to share my experience:

1. Van engine, as our friend mentioned above, is put in a rather closed space with verry little air flow to cool, then it normal get hot in the summer or when it's overloaded. Particularly when you put a kayak on top of it, then climb some hill :pissed:, and in a hot summer day.

2. To make sure your head gasket is sill ok or not, you can open the engine compartment (better when the engine is cool - never do this when the engine is hot), open the radiator cap. You can put a towel cover the opened hole of the radiator (to prevent water blow to the ceiling), then start the engine.
- If the water is blow strongly to the ceiling, your head gasket is surely gone - you have to replace it immediatly
- If not, you can remove the towel, then looking to the water in the hole (the engine still running). If it has a lot of bubles get out from deep below, your head gasket is small broken and need to be replaced soon
- If you have no buble at all, even when you can see the water flow in the hole - your head gasket is OK.

3. To get the engine be better cooled, in our tropical area here, we can do some thing:

- To replace the mechanic cooling fan (with the engine) - by an electric fan. This also can help save some space in the engine compartment beside a better cooling ability

- Trying to clear the air-way from the van nose (air intake holes in front of your van) to the radiator (this space normaly is above of the A/C condense radiator). This way normaly filled with hoses, and a lot of things and reduces the air-flow. Stronger air-flow means your radiator (and your engine) be better cooled.

- clean the radiator (inside), and may replace it with a better one (it can not be wider, but it can be thicker)

I hope through my experience, you can get some ideas to get your van run better and better

Best regards