What engine temp are you normally around?
 

Hey guys,

For some reason my car was acting a little strange today. First after my friend was driving it a little aggressively, we shut it off for a few minutes and then got back in the car. When he turned it on the car stuttered a bit and for a few seconds it had trouble getting the RPMs up. Like it was about to stall. I don't know if he let the clutch out at a bad time or something, but I couldn't replicate it anymore. The other thing I noticed was that the car was running a little hotter than usual. Usually the car remains just under the 200 degree mark. Today (72* Outside temp) it remained above it all afternoon. Driving it a little harder I could get it up to two ticks over 200*. I started driving it normally, but the temp would not come down under 200. It sat around one click over 200. I guess I haven't driven it aggressively for extended periods of time. When I came home I let it sit with the hood open for a couple of minutes and the temperature just wouldn't come down from a tick over 200. I turned it off for a min and then back on and the temp sat just under 200..I watched it for a while at idle and revved it up a little and it didn't really move from just under 200.

So I thought the normal temperature was around a tick under 200*. What are you guys getting under normal driving conditions? How about when you drive it more aggressively on the street? It just seems a little weird that it would do that stuttering thing and then the temps sit a little higher.. Maybe I'm just being paranoid, but it doesn't hurt to ask.

My temps are usually 200 after it "warms up". It gets to 220 after long drives on the highway. I've gotten it up to 230 after spirited driving and then it cools and stays around 220.

Cool thats what I wanted to hear.

Temps
 

I noticed the same thing when driving very aggressive, the temp would climb to 200, used to all my other vehicles being in the 165 to 185 range. When doing about 120 and coming down it will reach about 210 but never higher, thinking summertime is going to suck for speeding if this car overheats...

D

OK perfect, I am glad I'm within the normal range...

Oh mama good thread... just what i needed.

I changed oil on Saturday, went full synthetic Mobile 1, and all of the sudden I see 200 on the oil temp gauge, jumps up to about 230, once i get going and just stays there, then kinda goes down, at first i thought it was a lack of oil, i guess now its just how the car is.


water temp is the same though, it stays 1 click under the medium.

^^ Yup

Maybe a fan mod would help keep the temps down a bit? That or a 180 degree Tstat? I'm not sure if it will help the Z much, but 200+ seems a little high. I've had performance cars of all kinds and they never hovered above 200 unless they were driven really hard.

yes, that is what is worrying me, one of our Daytona prototypes hit 250 once, and it began melting fuel lines, hell I am only 20F off that mark.

but for some reason only 3 of us in here seem to see this problem.

Well this is the first year of the new 370, so this may be a bug that may pop up in more and more of them as time moves forward. Another idea is that you can purchase an oil cooler kit, which should definitely help. The only downside is that it is not going to be an inexpensive mod.

but i should not need to buy extra crap to fix a problem that Nissan should have solved.

my biggest worry, was this just happened when i changed the oil at 1,300 miles to mobile one. or maybe it always ran this high i just never noticed it.

but the water temp is ok, then again that is what the radiator is for.

my water temp is always a couple dots below half, but my oil temps when i drive on the highway are between 200-220 here in hot florida

^^^ ok so you are in my same boat then, and the other floridian is too. Now we are kinda getting somewhere with this.

I called my nissan dealership, and asked, but its like talking to a starfish about quantum mechanics.

they have no idea, according to them that is normal operating temps for a car, if the problem gets worse call them.

so essentially if my block becomes one solid piece of metal, then they will try and answer my question.

^^haha ya. the car seems fine. Ive run it hard several times against friends, but the temp never passed the 220. It just looks like the needle on the gauge looks high becuase of the way the gauge is set up. I'll let u know when my block is a solid piece! haha...well thats actually not gonna be funny.

Mine did the same thing, several times now, its after driving a bit and then getting back in, it stutters and feels like it's going to stall. :mad:
When I had my Nismo exhaust installed I had them check this, of course they didn't find anything wrong.
RCZ: Do you know what brand of gas you were running? I know for sure I had just filled up the night before with Shell 91Oct. And Im almost sure that was what I was using the last time it happened.
Could it be a detergent or additive in the fuel?

Oil temp is between 180 - 220 range, usually hovers around 200. I hate to see what it's going to be like in mid summer when it's 90-100 degrees out side.

As a side note, I just changed the oil to Royal Purple synthetic this last weekend, it did nothing to lower the oil temp, but Im certain the car feels quicker, it seams to rev faster and have more torque, it could be my imagination but I could swear the car gained 10+ HP.

Looks like we are in need of some after market oil cooler. What were the 350z oil temps running at, were they similar??

^^ i do not think its the fuel, i run 93 octane V-power on mine and it is still high as hell. apparently its not the oil either, you use royal purple i use mobile 1.

We have 93 here, I'm not sure that it was the gas. I think there was some unburnt gas left in the system and it choked up a bit when I started it back up. It used to happen a little on my STI as well. It clears right up though. It might also just be crappy winter gas.

I went to the dealer yesterday and talked to a master tech that did the course on the GT-R and everything. He said I should only use their "ester oil" when I do any oil changes...I don't know if that is because they want to make a buck or because our cars really do need it.

I am going on the track on saturday... I'll let you all know what happens to the temperature...

Our cars definitely require ester in the motor oil but you shouldn't need to put Nissan Ester Oil specifically, just get a good oil with a lot of esters in it.

Like?

I think this car need after market oil cooler .
but hope this is normal

I thumbed through the Pegasus catalogue yesterday to see what the parts would cost to build an oil cooler. It looks like $550 - $600 to do it right. That would included a Mocal or Setrab oil cooler (AN -10 or -12 fittings, lines, fittings, oil filter plate adapter and an in-line thermostat. This price would be for premium lines and fittings. It looks like a short cooler may fit in the fender based on some press photos.

I've done this on a 993, RSA America and 944 turbo with very good results. The trick is to fab the anchors and route the lines. Take a block of Styrofoam and cut it to the size of the cooler you want to use. Then find a place to mount it that allows routing the lines. You can access the left fender on the Z through a small piece on the engine side of the radiator which would make routing the lines very easy. The right fender appears to have some type of reservoir in it.

You could do it for about half the price if you went with budget lines/fittings and left out the thermostat.

I may get energetic this week and take a few measurements.

Alan, let me know. I have like 4 different oil cooler prospects right now. I'm waiting to see what comes out first and $.

RCZ

I'll let you know what I find. It's going to be pretty cold in Cincinnati to be out in the garage for the next couple of days.

Another item to look at is the diff. From what I gather it may need a cooler as well. A good pump is already available. It doesn't look like it would be to hard to mount a cooler for the diff. It might be an issue with the oil being to cold in some circumstances. However, you could always run a temp gauge and an on/off switch into the cabin.

subscribed....will chime in after i drive my car more.

this really has my attention as it gets hot in texas as well in the coming months AND i get my car tomorrow and have a 240mi trip this friday

Alan i hape i see your results as soon as possible .

Yeah i played with the car a little on saturday, and in a matter of minutes i was up at 230-240 F.


So I went to the dealer to talk to them, and they said that a car normally runs at 200-210, when pushed this increases to 230-250. HE said it was perfectly normal for this, and showed me on a GTr they had on the shop. That thing would sit at 220 without really going over 5k rpm.


So I started looking around at other vehicles to see what is up. My shifter kart measured 260F, my Honda 600rr was at 210, and when riding at speed, cooled to 186. My neighbors mustang hovers at 285F, but that thing has something wrong with it.

on another note. if you look at the gauge itself. it goes from 100-300. with 200 right in the middle.

Now as an Engineer if I was to design tat gauge I would have the measurement be in the middle. That way when the car is running that needle is in the center, and at a quick glance you can now see if your running hot, or cool, without really having to look.


At least that how I do thing when I had race cars, set up all the gauges so the needles while operating pointed straight up. So when one was not pointing up you could tell really quick.


so thats all I have been able to figure out so far. I brought my Thermal DatAq with me to work, ill try and measure a 350 here, if the guy lets me do it.

on the track, the needle should be between 220-260, which is actually a "range" in the gauge.

My BMW 335i ran at about 240 all of the time. If pushed it would go up in a hurry. BMW felt this was the right temp.

On the other had I would have parked any air cooled Porsche I have owned in the past if the oil temp went above 230. Designs and oil have changed over time but I still had a hard time with 240F - 260F for my oil temp.

Not to barge in but is the general consensus between you guys to change the stock oil at 1k miles, then again at 3k? I'm about to pick up my 370 tomorrow and am planning a 700+ mile roadtrip early April (hope to have about 700-1k miles on it by then)... I'd like to know if it's best to change the stock oil before i do the trip.

My oil temp is right around 195 F. (30 degrees out)

mine is about 190-200. one time after driving on the freeway for like 2 hours i was at 220-230ish. but i'm driving like a grandpa since i'm still breakin' in the car.

That's how I ran my Autometers in my Mustangs. All of the needles were straight up for a quick reference. Also, analog gauges read the most accurate towards the middle of the range, rather than at the extremes. I'm sure the engineers designing the gauges took this into consideration.

30 mile drive, with little city mixed in, highway speeds up and down hills and 60 degrees outside with sun out.

Creeped its way up to 180 then settled on 200

Not to mention all grandpa style driving

Ive been taking my 500 mile old 370 on little trips to Carlsbad from San Diego to get some miles in and in 70 degree weather the hottest the oil got up was about 2 clicks over 220. Im pretty sure this isnt an issue considering the water temp always stays 1 or 2 clicks below the middle. And people never complained about oil temps on 350z because we didnt have an oil temp gauge im sure were going to find out sooner or later that this is normal operating temperatures for this car. If not Nissan would probably do a recall and do something about it. I wouldnt worry about it, its a new car, worst case it is a problem and Nissan will fix it.... hopefully. :)

220-260 is normal.

Mine was at 300 on the track. Not normal... car went into limp mode and wouldn't rev past 5k.

It wont rev past 5k after track until it cooled down? or permanently?
This **** pisses me off.

Only till it cools down, its a failsafe.

Any trouble changing over to non-Nissan oil? I've seen rumblings about noises at high rpms. I'm thinking about going with Royal Purple myself.

Is Nissan aware of this overheating issue? If they are, why aren't they doing anything to rectify this situation?

Calling the thread Crypt Keeper...