I’ve got a 2013 ec160d and I’m starting to have problems with it getting warm. I changed the thermostat 2 days ago and it seemed to help some but it will still randomly get up to about 3/4 on the temp gauge. I let it sit for 1 minute and it will go back down to normal and be good for another 20-30 minutes. I washed the radiator out this morning and it did great for 4 hours of demo and then it climbed up to 3/4 again? It had fresh coolant, radiator wash, and new thermostat. I’m lost on what to do now. Thanks for any help!
All your basic maintenance is up to date? Air cleaners good? No error codes? How many hours? Any emissions problems?
From what I have read on here, everybody says the radiators are washed out but they very seldom are as clean as what they think. How did you wash them out and did you use a flashlight to verify that light will pass thru or show there is still more washing out to do. Also, you stated you used it for demo which I think creates a lot of dust??? Hope this could be helpful.
1. Check if the foam on the side of the water tank is still there and whether it will fall off during cleaning. If it falls off, it will cause poor cooling effect.
Yes the foam or whatever to concentrate the fan flow to the radiator and coolers are very important and with age and washing tend to get ripped out.
Good evening gentlemen. Thanks for the replies. I washed the radiator out again this morning and there was very little grime that came out. I let the radiator dry out with the machine idling for about 1 hour. I ran it digging stumps out and taking down big 24” trees (much more load on the machine vs demo). It ran perfect for about 1.5 hours and then climbed up to 3/4 temp again. Let it sit for a simple 1 minute at idle and it cools right back down to normal, run it for 15 more minutes and it climbs back up to 3/4……. Machine has 3100 hours on it and is 20 hours away from the next oil/fuel filter service. All new hydraulic oil and filters about 100 hours ago when I had a rotary manifold failure…… I’ve had it throw a random eas failure alarm saying to emergency shut down but doesn’t give me a code. Had my heavy equipment mechanic come look at it and he told me that it was probable because I had just changed the batteries……. A problem I’ve had for a long time is about every 12 hours the gauges, screen will freeze up and I will loose heat/air. I simply kill the battery switch for about a minute and it will be back to normal…… As far as the overheating goes I’m starting to question the fan clutch. This evening when it got warm I opened the motor compartment and felt how much air it was moving and it didn’t feel very strong. I shut the machine down and and unplugged the fan sensor wire to see if it would blow harder like it’s supposed to. Cranked it back up and had the alarm on fan failure so I know that’s working. Went back to motor compartment and it was blowing the same amount of air that it was with everything hooked up. Called my local dealer today and they want an outrageous $3200 for another fan clutch. I’ve had 2 mechanics tell me that if I don’t want to spend the $3200 at the moment then I could drill 2 holes throw the clutch on both sides and make it be on high all the time? I’m somewhat mechanically inclined but this is over my head. What are your thoughts? I came here to check with the mechanics on here because there arnt any mobile mechanics around here that know Volvos good. I just got done going ahead and pulling the fan and clutch. I’m debating on going ahead and doing what they are talking about to get by and then do a full replacement after I can find one at a more reasonable price. Thanks for the help so far!
Btw all the foam is still in good shape and the radiator looks clean on the inside as well.
I would be hesitant to ruin a big dollar fan clutch. That said, in spite of the alarm, did the fan increase air flow when unplugged? Where is your hydraulic oil temp during this high temp spike. OMG, how stupid! Totally skipped over that you have a D series. Get into service mode and monitor actual temperature. Forget this normal range bs. Let's see actual numbers. You should also be able to monitor fan speed as well. Let us know what you see. BTW , to alleviate emissions problems, thermostats were raised to 195°F from 178 iirc. So your running temp should be closer to 200-205 at the cylinder head. If outlet temp is a monitored value, share that as well. Good luck
Service mode, scroll down to the wrench symbol, press and hold the enter key, the screen will say, "enter service mode" you'll know you're in service, the wrench symbol will appear on the bottom. Scroll back up to engine and monitor values.
Are you sure it's just that the fan clutch is broken? Do you have a part number? I estimate it only costs 200usd.
So I have the fan clutch removed and can see where it leaked out some of the silicone oil all around it and on the fan blades some. This kinda reconfirms to me that the clutch is the issue. I feel like it runs for a while perfectly fine until the clutch gets warm. Once it gets warm I think it starts slipping preventing the fan from turning fast enough and creating the overheating. Part #14648084……. Me and my mechanic worked on it trying to disassemble it with no hope. We wanted to make sure that bolts going through it would for sure lock it up all the time before I got into a worse situation. Now the game plan is to put it back together factory and add some electric cooling fans temporarily to help me get through this big demo job/dig new basement for 6,000 sqft house on the lake. I just picked this custom home builder up and I’m doing everything in my power to make this happen smooth and fast for him so I can continue to earn his business……. My local Volvo dealer is just crazy on the parts pricing. Funwithfuel, thank you for telling me how to put it in service mode!!! I will do that once I put it back together and see what the actual temperatures and fan speeds are!!
I wouldn't worry till you see temps bumping 212°-215°
I have the fan clutch with the part number you need.
So I installed the fan clutch back in the machine and then wired in 2 high power electric fans blowing trough the radiator from the condenser side. The lowest I can get the electric fans makes them blow through the top quarter of the water cooler and 75% of the hydraulic cooler. I’ve been running the machine today in service mode. It took the machine a good while to warm up with all the fans running. I started tearing this house down and the machine ran good and cool for about 1 hour averaging about 190 ect. After 1 hour it started getting warm on me (ect 215). I let it sit for about 5 minutes and then can run it for about 10 minutes before it climbs back to 215. I haven’t let it go past 215. The other day, before I put the electric fans on, I released the hydraulic oil was warming up just like the coolant. Well today I can see that the hydraulic oil stays around 170. I’m about to buy a fan clutch and I sure hope that solves my problem.
Im kinda thinking you might wanna check for combustion gasses in the cooling system. Napa sells a kit for 60-80 dollars depending on location. Make sure you get the one for diesel. I think I would go that direction before I spent s fortune on a fan hub that may or may not be needed.
So are you thinking it has a blown head gasket?
Maybe, maybe a liner. Not very likely if you're not losing coolant. Its weird how it hits a threshold and then starts climbing. Maybe the thermostat is getting lazy.
Do you have an infrared temp gun? I guess we should make sure your radiator is actually shedding heat.
I do have a temp gun and the head is reading the exact same temp as the service mode is saying.
Do you think this fan clutch would work on my machine? https://a.co/d/63FLuOH
Im not looking for disparity between head temp and gauge. We want to see the temp difference between upper and lower radiator tank temps. Ideally, we want to see 34-40°f temp drop, top to bottom. The fact that you have pushers helping with air flow and are still struggling says we are either plugged up, have insufficient coolant flow or an unwanted heat source. Have you verified that your water pump has an impeller properly attached?
Not applicable, the electronic control modules are different, the EC160D has a 6-pin cable, the Amazon one has a 5-pin cable, and Amazon doesn't have merchant customer service to answer your question?
The last statement from FWF about the water pump is a real good call, also have you physically flushed the radiator internally? I know a lot of people concentrate on unblocking between the vanes externally, completely forgetting that the internal core can become blocked with silt/rust, as he said, if you can get a heat gun and check between top and bottom and sides of the radiator to see if you hot spots.
Well I swapped out the fan clutch this morning and the ect never went above 203 today. Fingers crossed that everything is good for a while. Thank y’all for your help!
thanks for reporting back