not sure if my car is overheating

[jessetheaviator]

i bought an 06 cobalt ls a few months ago. my coolant temperature has never went over 192 degrees. i recently got in an accident where they replaced the radiator and did a few other front end things. the place had my car for 2 weeks gave it back and it was leaking transmission fluid, and overheating. took it back a 3rd time, its still overheating. my temperature will get over 200 degrees, sometimes in excess of 210. the coolant is full. the fan is not coming on.
the company said they brought it to a radiator mechanic and he said the fan is working correctly and it shouldn't come on until 210 degrees.

any ideas?
what are some of your typical coolant temperatures seen?

thanks much.

[Chester]

mine usualyy sits at 189 to 192 sometimes gets higher when sittin in traffic...seems like the mechanics from whoever repaired it from the first place didnt do it correctly

[jessetheaviator]

actually i just read a few posts on one forum that help me out a litttle.

What's the temp? Guage

it says you can change the temperature at which the fan comes on. how so? is this something a mechanic has to do? i am not very good at fixing stuff on my car.
for the people whos temperature sits around 190, is that when the fan comes on?

[dtadla]

two quick possibilities first is check the coolant itself and make sure its orange. I know pretty much all new cars use the orange coolant but its worth a look. If the coolant is the old green kind that can cause some serious probs in a car thats supposed to have the orange coolant. the other possibility is a bit more of a pain in the butt. That would be air bubbles in the coolant. With sealed coolant systems filling up the coolant system is a real pain and there's lots of bleeding involved kinda like the brake system. If you have air bubbles in the coolant you'll get wild changes in the temp and overheating. just some ideas.

[jsepulveda89]

It actually isnt all that hard to remove air bubbles if that is the case. Just carefully remove the radiator cap and turn the car on and then turn the defroster on full blast with the heat all the way up. That always works for us at my work.

[07ls sport]

your fine, when i used to let my car sit in the driveway for a period of time running, it gets up to 220. i thought it was too hot but the dealer said that it was a normal temp considering the vehicle was stationary. but it should run on average from 189-192 during driving.

[jessetheaviator]

thanks for the replys.
my car has been running between 190 - 200 when driving and standing still it gets up to 220 or so before the fan comes on. its just odd since before the accident it was steady at 190.

[Mkulrey13]

you are fine, until it gets over 240 then you should be worried. These cars are made to run hot. Fans kick on at 220ish.

Another possibilty is that the put a different temperature thermostat in when they changed the radiator fluid. The thermostat is what controls the fan, so it is something to look at as well.

[disklog]

For what it is worth, in my experience, my cobalt seems to stay at a constant 194 when the AC is on. When the AC is off, the temp varies depending if the car is moving or standing still.