If you're in Arizona what temp is your car running at

Mine goes up to the line past 180, and the Climate Control AC Diagnostics trick shows me running at temps as high as 235 today. What are your temps?

shouldn't matter where u live or what the outside temp is.. car should run consistent..... if not u have a problem :-( my fam has a weekend place in scottsdale and we have a 2000 996 cab there... it runs at the same temp as mine does in the summer there 113 deg vs mine here in seattle 75 deg..

I hate AZ in the summer. I don't drive my C4S too much this time of year.

You may want to get the waterpump / impeller checked out and possibly run OEM Coolant. FWIW, How long do you drive the car for in order to get that hot? once I reach operating temp ( 5-10 minutes at low rpm, the needle usually stays between the 8 and the 0, but only if I'm in extended traffic does it get close to half over or near past the 0 ( where yours it at). at straight highway driving ( little to no traffic), it stays put right between the 8 and 0. Temps here in Miami, FL are hovering right at 90-92 mid day ; i dont have any fan mods and still running Porsche coolant.

Mine stops before the middle of the 0. I cleaned out the radiators a while back. Might be a good idea ? Todd 99 coupe

yup +1 for get the waterpump checked (I just posted the same thing on the other thread)

Most P's are different, some people put a different oil, some rides are older, newer, 91 or 94 fuel, brand new water pump, older water pump, more or less coolant etc. etc. The one thing all P's should do is be more or less at the same max operating temp, regardless of weather. So if your ride is always just past the 0 of your 180 mark I wouldn't worry about it (unless it's a Honda ) If it fluctuates, goes any higher or light start flashing... like Ed said, water-pump (or coolant leak but that's easy to see). Cheers, Sid.

But it's a DRY heat.

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Fixed

Seeing the low post count maybe you don't know some things. With the a/c on the radiator fans should kick into high I believe. Most the time for me that means the car rides cooler since the fans are on. If your fans are screwing up on the two speeds they should run at then that could be your problem. One or both of them might not be giving you the performance required. Heck the auto tiptronic has 3 radiators to cool. If things are getting hot for the engine it seems resonable to make sure the a/c is on. This is if when you check for the louder running of the fans listening to both sides in the front you hear both fans going to town on running air through the radiators. Little things and the darn stuff that packs into the radiators from years of public roads. Does the 99 model do the temp on the a/c controls? If so how do you do that trick? I tried it one time from a short memory

So someone thinks that Porsche OEM coolant cools better than others. Personally I think it just heats up Porsche profits.

Multitude of things to check but it shouldn't be running that hot. I'd check the simplest first like coolant level or a cap that won't hold proper pressure. Then have the T-stat, impeller, and fans checked out. Also, you can install a rehostat(sp) switch to turn the fans to high speed when you're in traffic, etc... A honest dealer (oxymoron?) or trusted Indy should be able to source your problem....

My C4S used to always run the same temperature - with the needle right betwee the 8 and the 0. Lately in Denver it has been 95 - 100 degrees. When I've been in traffic on I-70, it tends to run hotter, passing the 0, close to what you are showing in your photo. I guess that probably puts me in the 220 range, but it's hard to tell from that gauge. As soon as traffic clears and I get moving, it drops back down to the normal range. I'm thinking I need a good radiator cleaning.

Try this. Every time you stop and idle in traffic park the car so its pointed into the wind . Works great for planes when doing your run up. It does make a difference if you are up on the next cars tail trapping radiating heat or if the wind is from the front. You could try raising the tail to see if it runs any cooler. All of this is of course after verifying the radiators are clear and everything else is up to par. Not a gauges are created equal from what I have found in life.

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Nor are sending units....

I removed the bumper cover cleaned out 11 years worth of crap from the radiators then power washed them. I dumped the coolant and switched to straight distilled water and 2-12 OZ bottles of Water Wetter. I did the cooling fan mod and engine compartment mod. I use the Porsche AC Diagnostics to display the coolant temp on the left side of the climate control center. When it shows 85C thats 185F I can tell the thermostat has opened because boiling hot air is pouring out of the discharge on both the left and right sides of the front bumper from the cooling fans. As far as I can tell, everything on my 996 is working, maybe it just runs hot. On a side note I went to a Porsche Pancakes breakfast this morning and it was only 95 degrees here. My coolant never went higher then 98C, thats 208F on a 45 mile round trip. But it was only 95F, yesterday it was 116F.

the only thing you haven't mentioned is the waterpump. ;-)

so, was there a lot of crap in the rads? cleaning it should def help. +1 on consistent temp no matter what the weather temp. Unless the car is on the track... thats a diff story.

If the water pump was not working correctly, the bearing would be making noise and water certainly would not be flowing through the radiators as it is. The discharge air temp below the radiators is super hot. How do I test the WATER PUMP?

I am no Porsche expert... but I believe the only way it to pull it... the pump consists of little plastic impellers and they can have pieces break off which makes them much less efficient... here is a link to some pictures and a how to I found through google.. http://p-car.com/996/diy/waterpump/

I've been told the 997 pump has larger and stronger impeller blades and that's it bolts right up to the 996's. Can anyone confirm that?....

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I'm still hoping to find a load of cash in my car, it sure wasn't in my radiator just crap and more crap... guess that's better than this guy who posted pics of finding a ... are you ready for it... A RAT in his airbox . Finding money, nice A stripper... awesome!!! A dead rat!... not so much Cheers, Sid.

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If the water pump wasn't working you'd know it. The engine would suffer localized overheating and at some point spew coolant as the pressure from the ever increasingly hot engine raised coolant pressure. If you want, start the engine cold, let it idle. Ideally you'd want the car in the air -- securely -- so you could keep tabs on the coolant lines to the radiators. They should get hot when the coolant temp rises to the point the t-stat opens and allows coolant -- pumped by the water pump -- to flow to/through and out of radiators back to the engine. In short as long as the engine is not exhibiting any signs of overheating or excessive pressure in the cooling system the water pump's ok. If you're concerned about the possibility of the water pump losing one or more impellor blades one possible check out would to drain the coolant into a clean container and check for presence of impeller material in the fluid. The only other way would be to remove the water pump and inspect it. At this point even if the pump looked ok depending upon the miles it might be reasonable to just replace it. 'course, then you have to worry the new pump might suffer premature failure (infant death) and you end up experiencing with a new pump what you feared from the old pump. BTW, here's a pic of my 02 Boxster's water pump -- which failed (noisy bearing and just the hint of a leaking seal) -- at 172K miles. I think you need to find something else to worry about. Sincerely, Macster.

azrob, I asked my indi a few questions on the WP, and overheating / impeller breaking up, etc.. And I just finished reading fbh2go's thread on his expansion tank... you may want to check if you are leaking fluid thru hairline cracks in the coolant tank.... is your tank white or yellow (ing)? and if you have replaced the cap with the updated cap ...? FWIW, I thought it was relatively easy to get to the WP...apparently the engine brace is in the way and it is pretty involved to get to it to R & R...

This is steering away from the topic a little but anyone tried this stuff? No affiliation.

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yeah, azrob, has drained his system and decided running distilled water and RL Waterwetter would help ( post #16); but apparently, his car is still running hot!

I never have but many who track their car use it and it seems to work ok. In some places anti-freeze is verboten cause it can cause a safety hazard if coolant dumped on a tire on the track. I am not sure how well this stuff protects against freezing. It might not offer much protection cause that's well that's anti-freeze's job. Boil over protection is more a function of the cooling system's ability to maintain pressure once the coolant is up to temperature. Sincerely, Macster.

yeah, he's running for the reason in AZ, where he currently doesn't need anti-freeze and maybe the DW and WW will have better cooling ( or heat dissapation properties).

I added a 2nd 12 ounce bottle of Water Wetter on Saturday morning after doing the fan hack on Friday morning. It took a day of driving and possibly the Water Wetter has helped pop bubbles in the system but the temps have dropped from a high of 235F. On my drive into work this morning it was 95 degrees outdoors. By the time I got to work, 22 miles away the climate control diagnostic display showed a coolant temp of 95C thats 203F and the outside temp is 100F in central Scottsdale. On the way home I walked out of work into 108F air. Drove home, the outside temp dropped as I got closer to Carefree down to 101F and the climate control diagnostics temp never went higher than 103C on the trip, thats 217F. I watched it go up at lights and back down as I drove - the cooling system is working fine. My conclusion is between replacing the expansion tank cap, cleaning the radiators, flushing the coolant, adding one bottle of Water Wetter, hacking the fans and finally adding a 2nd bottle of Water Wetter the car really is running cooler. My dash gauge never goes past the zero in 180 and was passing the 3/4 line past the 180 before I did everything.

thats what mine runs at...

My 2003 C4 stays at the middle of the zero, even in the summer, and I live in Tucson. My car does have the third radiator however.