Fail safe thermostat

[Mike Croke]

This winter, I could not get any heat when driving to work in the morning. Coolant temp is usually under 140° for most of the drive. Each morning as I drove, I would blame myself for installing an Autozone "fail safe" thermostat instead of a Motorcraft piece.

Sufficiently motivated today, I bought a new thermostat and upon removing the old one discovered what is seen in the pictures. My SWAG is that is a piece of the inner spring from the lower radiator hose.

Tomorrow, I should have heat in the am!

[MikeFleming]

That's definitely a trophy piece!!

[rodster]

Wow, that's crazy. Would have never guessed that!

[boardmaster]

Doing a thermostat change and got a question. The original one that came out looks like the one pictured above. The replacement one does not. In other words, the original one sits recessed in the hosing as the replacement one sits flush with the housing. Which is right?

[dznj]

My SVO was doing the same thing. I had pulled the factory original Motorcraft and replaced it with an Autozone unit when I had the motor out about 2 years ago. Car always ran cold. Pulled T-Stat:


I put a NAPA one in this time..
<a href="http://s1029.photobucket.com/user/dmoglin/media/1985%20Ford%20Mustang%20SVO/IMG_20141128_124522_475_zpssryim0ik.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1029.photobucket.com/albums/y356/dmoglin/1985%20Ford%20Mustang%20SVO/IMG_20141128_124522_475_zpssryim0ik.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo IMG_20141128_124522_475_zpssryim0ik.jpg"/></a>

We'll see how long this one lasts....