Overheating after head gasket replacement?

[simonsi]

All sounds good to me.

[geniushanbiao]

I also think you might have some coolant gunks in the system...try flush it hard. Did you ever mix coolant or the shop used green coolant?

It is not good to have bubbles in the tank when cap is off... This always means that the coolant is not good any more. Did the shop use new coolant or old?

The heat delay is probably normal but it might indicates that the heater is clogged somewhat...

Have your system flushed, then fill with water and then run the engine to hot, then drain, flush again(you can do the fill water run hot twice or more), fill with VW coolant 50/50 diluted with distilled water. Then see what's going on.

Originally Posted by Bobless

I think that may be the case.

When I took it for the drive this morning, I had the heat on and it was blowing cool air. All of a sudden it switched to warm.

It's not showing any signs of overheating. The bubbles in the reservoir tank happen only when the cap is off and the car gets up to temperature -- probably takes 10 minutes or so before they appear.

When the cap is on, there are no bubbles and the red temperature light doesn't come on.

No white exhaust smoke, no odd smells, nothing that indicates the engine is overheating. Coolant level seems to be staying level too.

The smaller of the two cooling fans has kicked on now, as well, after a period of in-town driving.

I think there was air trapped in the system that was causing the problem.

[Bobless]

A quick update on the head gasket repair.

Lesson learned, I took the Beetle to a shop that specializes in VW repairs. On the other side of town and not too convenient, but well worth the extra effort.

Despite the fact the car was showing no signs of overheating, I asked them to flush and fill the coolant system because I wanted to be certain the system was working properly and that the correct coolant and ratio had been used.

They found no problems with the system and the car has been driven daily each of the past five days. Absolutely no overheating issues, coolant levels have remained steady and the car is running fine after more than 200 miles on the road.

Thanks to everyone for your suggestions -- burping the system to get the air out appears to be all that was needed.

Next on the agenda are a left wheel bearing and brake rotors ...

[D2Beetle]

Glad to hear that it turned out to be an easy solution.