Do you have the 1” spacer in place behind the water pump? If so, then removing the ‘T-Bird’ specific spacer will improve the water flow at low rpms. The water pump pulley will need to be moved back forward that missing one inch to correct for the belt alignment to compensate for the ‘removed’ spacer.

---

Another item that helps is to put a restrictor in the bypass line between the thermostat housing and the water pump. An eighth inch hole in the restrictor will suffice for that.

Lorena, Texas (South of Waco)

I would definitely use a 50/50 mix of antifreeze and distilled water. Glycol based coolants were originally developed in part, to allow designers to use smaller (area) radiators on aircraft engines. The smaller and thus more aerodynamic radiators exploited the fact that ethylene glycol conducted heat significantly better than water alone. As mentioned above, briefly revving the engine in neutral would have probably helped to increase circulation of both air and coolant. Shutting off the engine while over heated is an invitation to more problems. That should be avoided if possible. Over all though, I wouldn't fret about it too much. Iron motors are generally pretty tolerant of temperature but they aren't unbreakable. Install a proper mixture of antifreeze + distilled water and keep cruising.

Do you have any temperature reducer in the water? I would add some 40 Below or something like it. Antifreeze has a higher boiling point than water but the additives help. I think you may have just stressed your cooling system on the first outing. Stop and go traffic will do it every time. Having the water level down even a little can cause changes in behavior. Also, I bet it you had brought your RPM up to 1500 or higher it would have helped. If the idle is correct it should be ok. Just make sure you are full of water next time and see what happens. Chuck

Y's guys rule!
Looking for McCullouch VS57 brackets and parts. Also looking for 28 Chrysler series 72 parts. And early Hemi parts.

MoonShadow, 292 w/McCulloch, 28 Chrysler Roadster, 354 Hemi)
Manchester, New Hampshire

Yeah, I know it is a perennial problem, but I had my first experience with overheating in traffic yesterday. Never had a problem before, but I was in very slow stop & go for about an hour on my way to cruise night. It was about 80 degrees outside... not really hot, but the traffic was bad enough that the car was stopped most of the time. Maxed out the factory temp gauge. I have a mechanical gauge in the bypass line, which indicated around 210. It normally reads about 20 degrees cooler than the manifold, but of course I wasn't able to get out and check the temp with an IR gauge.

As the engine kept getting hotter, I popped the rear-opening hood to increase the air flow. As temps rose further, I turned on the heater. Finally, I started turning off the engine when the car wasn't moving. In hindsight, turning off the engine was probably a bad idea, huh? It didn't boil-over that I could tell. I knew the engine was hot because it dieseled when I shut it off... it has never done that before. One thing I did NOT do was rev the engine a little, which might have helped move more air and water around... my idle is set pretty low. Once the car was moving steadily again, the temps settled right down into normal range, and everything ran fine. No dieseling when I finally parked.

My engine is a fresh 292 (2Kmi), decked block, 113 heads milled for 9:1 SCR, Mummert 265 cam, Mallory unilite (mechanical only), 12 deg. BTDC @ idle. Runs very strong. I have a 6 bladed fan, "normal" water pump and pulley, and use a recovery tank. The level was low when I got to cruise night. It may have been low to start with, I didn't check. I'm running just distilled water with radiator relief. I know that there are things I can do to increase cooling... I'm considering getting an electric pusher fan. I've heard of installing a modified heavy duty big block fan & thermal clutch. But this experience got me second guessing my actions yesterday...

So, what do you guys do when you get stuck in traffic and the water temp heads skyward? Do you wait for the cloud of steam and then pull over?