Hello all so I bought my 85 toy pickup efi recently and I took it out for a test drive. After throwing it on 4wd and a few rounds of punching the gas and going up hills, coolant gashed out of the reserve tank and the engine over heated. After it cooled and added more fluid I went for a second round of wheeling. Then I started to smell the burning of the clutch that's when I decided to call it a day....

Could the clutch be the reason why the engine over heated ??? Does it sound like I might need a new clutch??

By the way on the highway none of this is happening...

 

one way to tell if the clutch is going bad go about 35 or so put it in 5th if it just revs up then its slipping bad

 

On 2wd right? It's not slipping at all on 2wd...

 

were you in 4 hi or 4 lo? If in 4 lo, you could easily burn your clutch and transmission up by revving it too high. I'm sorry, I do not know why the vehicle would overheat because of that though. Could it be possible the vehicle was overheating and you didn't realize it till the reserve blew? In this case it could be from the lack of movement and a possible bad fan clutch.

 

I was in 4lo and revving high...I did also notice that the fan cover (shroud) was not mounted properly. But just because it smelled a lot like clutch it doesn't necessarily means it needs one???

 

Did you check the transmission fluid level before you bought it or went wheeling. It could be low. If you didn't rev engine for very long in 4 lo, you may have gotten away with it. I used to rev my '85s 4 lo high and it didn't hurt it as much as I thought it would. After thinking about it, does your radiator have transmission oil cooler lines? If the tranny fluid was way to hot, the lack of air flow and hot tranny fluid could have something to do with your vehicle overheating. So burning clutch smell could actually be burning tranny. Like was said earlier, put it in 5th while driving and if it revs it needs a new clutch. I would check fluid level first. I found out to check all the easy things first when trying to diagnose a problem. Also check transfer case fluid too.

 

If you have a clutch there is a pretty good chance you don`t have trans cooler lines going to the radiator.

The pushing water out may have been a air bubble in the cooling system.

The clutch burning may just have been from getting used to a new clutch notice I did not say your lack of driving skill.

Clutches are different I let a coworker use my truck to go less then 10 miles I had been driving that truck about a year and a half. With no clutch problems

They trashed the clutch in 10 miles to the point of it needing replaced

 

No I didnt check the tranns fluid, ( I'm new to all of this. I learned that I would much rather learn to do it myself rather than spending. Plus I enjoy doing it). I'm not sure if the trans has oil lines ill have to check. Very well ill have to check the transfer case fluid and ill test the clutch..

 

Hahaha thanks yea it is a new driver behind the wheel now, no offense taken. I'm not seasoned yet so I'm sure it had to do w me too. Come to think about it there is no transmission fluid lines just to get that out of the way...

 

Yea, I had a retard moment there with the trans lines.