I have a 98 Honda Civic. It does not seem to be leaking any coolant, but every 3 or 4 days the engine begins to overheat. When I use the a/c it seems to overheat ever sooner. Im wondering if something may be wrong with the cooling or a/c fans. Can anyone help me with this? Thanks!

 

Do you ever hear your fans kick in when the temperature rises? Makes any sort of odd noises?

You might need a coolant flush if the hoses are dirty and or the radiator. If the thermostat's broken your car might be just thinking it's overheating. That would be an easier thing to fix if it's that.

 

At times there is a loud squeaking noise that lasts about 3 seconds. When I stop the vehicle and turn the engine off sometimes, the coolant escapes through the top of the resevoir bottle. I will change the thermostat and see what happens.

 

Make sure your cooling fans are working.
I havea 97 Civic and sometime wonder how long the fans will last. Yesterday, I noticed my engine temp gauge was at the 2/3 mark while sitting in traffic. As soon as I got moving the temp drop almost instantaneoulsy. I went ahead and replace the rad cap an add some antifreeze/water to radiator. I'm thinking that the rad cap wasn't working properly because the overflow bottle was at thesame level at hot and cold situations. Supposely, as engine warms up the bottle fills up and as it cools down it suppose to sucktheantifreeze mixback to the radaitor. If I have anymore problems, the radiator is next to go.

 

another problem that you may be having is just that the coolant temperatue sensor is not functioning correctly.this is the sensor in the radiator hose near the thermostat.What will happen is that the sensor thinks the coolant is colder than it really is, which results in the radiator fan not turning on, and finally the engine overheating.

Not sure if this is exactly your problem, but mine was overheating when I was sitting still at trafficwhen the radiator got no air flow cuz it had no fan. As soon as i would start moving it would cool back down. After replacing the sensor, it has never overheated.

hope this helps

 

I had the same type of problem with a 98 Civic EX. The car would run fine on the open highway, but would overheat when sitting at lights, or in heavy traffic. I first changed the thermostat, but the problem continued.

I checked the fuse block under the hood. The fuse in the right corner, near the firewall, is for the radiator cooling fan. It is a mini 20 Amp fuse. The fuse was blown. I changed the fuse and the fan now kicks on when the temperature reaches a certain level.

There is also a relay switch for the cooling fan in this same fuse block. The diagram on the lid of the fuse block shows which fuse and which relay are for the cooling fan.

 

lets hope its just a closed thermostat... i had a problem with mine only it was stuckopen and my engine never warmed up.. screwed over my gas mileage until i fixed it.

 

I changed the thermostat and checked the cooling fan using a paperclip (saw that in another thread). The cooling fan works, but it does not seem to cut on while the engine is running. I drove the car for a while and when I parked I heard a bubbling sound (the sound I usually heard when the water escapes through the resovoir bottle). Could it then be the cooling fan relay or temperature sensor?

 

If you jumped the fan thermo switch with the paperclip and the fan came on, yet it doesn't come on when the engine heats up, that means the thermo switch is bad.

 

After changing the thermostat, radiator cap, and flushing the radiator, my car has not overheated. Thanks guys for the help!