Overheating again - but only in traffic / at junctions

[reds]

was having issues with overheating of the bike - within 1 mile the fuel guage was nearly maxed out. replaced thermostatic fan switch and for teh last 100 miles or so its been spot on (in between the two white lines)

however last night i was stuck behind a big lorry at about 10mph - and it went outside of the white lines, up towards half way - i also heard a bang / misfire sound at around about the same point it started to spike

have ridden it today for 20 odd miles, and it has been fine - right within the two marks, until i hit traffic again, or sat at a junction, and it started to raise out of the level of teh two white lines - however when i got my speed up again it would start to cool it down

any ideas what is causing this ???

[masterofinsanity]

yeah your bike is getting hot mate what you worrying about? worry if the fan don't kick in and it hits the red!

[reds]

ok- thanks baz - thought it was supposed to stay inbetween the two white points ! never really kept an eye on it before - but since replacing the thermo switch pay alot more attention to it !!!

[Miles]

I know this is slightly off topic but I'm having some heating problems as well. I have checked the fan, thermo fan switch, thermostat and the water temp. sensor and all 4 are working. Only problem is the fan doesn't kick in. I left the bike running in the garage to check it was working and the bike got almost to the top of the temp gauge so I switched it off to save doing any damage. Any one any ideas?

Also does anyone know where I can get a thermostat that will kick in earlier. I think the zxr one opens at 80'. I was looking for one around 70'. Just a friend of mine just came back from france yesterday on her's and she said she had massive over-heating problems when stuck in french traffic. I only ask as i'm making the same trip she did soon and I don't want to be stuck

[masterofinsanity]

take the thermostat out altogether

[cargo]

The thermostat won't make any difference to an over heating problem..............it serves one function it allows the bike to warm up faster but once the bike is up to normal temperature it ceases to have any function. Racers remove it so that there is nothing to restrict water flow so in the sense of running the bike a tiny little bit cooler your better off without one. But your bike will take a little longer to warn up especially on a cold morning in winter.

In normal use the fan does nothing...............it's purpose is to cut in to compensate for very warm weather and moving slowly in traffic or what ever it should not be cutting in during normal use..........................remember the bike was designed to run in much hotter countries than the UK............

Clearly your fan is not working and equally clearly it's an electricial fault of some kind or other.....................but what exactly is your overheating problem ? If you are riding along normally and the bike is getting so hot as to be in the red then you have much more than just a fault with the fan....................have you considered the possibliity that you radiator is full of years of road crud ?

[Miles]

Checked the radiator and it's fairly clean, cleaned it quite well when I pulled it apart after the river. Used a steam cleaner to help get crap out and straigten most of the fins as best I can.

I checked all the electrical componets to do with the fan in anyway (Fan, Fan thermo switch, thermostat, water temp. sensor, fuse). All are working fine. Checked them again today and again all were fine. Even checked the wiring with the multi-metre, but still nothing.

I've taken all the coolant pipes off, water pump and coolant filter and cleaned them indivually today so will do the re-build tonight and then see what's what.