Hose temps- upper and lower (kinda dumb question I know)

[diesan04]

Ok, here is the background. '04 GTP. Drove about 45 miles on the highway. Got off and slow rolled int raffic. Got every 'idiot' indication about "shutting off a/c". "high temperature alert" etc. as I watched the temp gauge spike from mid range to peak reading. immediately turned heater on high, put car in neutral and coast 35 feet into a gas station. let it cool, checked the reserve tank which was low. Ended up adding some coolant and drove home. fine. Left the car and the next day did a flush and fill (anyone else scurb the overflow bottle? that kinda sucked).

When I did the fill I made sure I had the bleed valve open and ensured the right quantity was added.

Now, 8 days later (checking coolant level every day with no issue) after driving the car with all temps in 'normal' range. I popped th hood tonight after driving just to check again.

Fluids are all good. The top radiator house (car was at normal operating temp- about 20 mins of driving) was plenty hot and fully pressurized from the tocuh. The lower hose was warm but not hot by any means and was presurized as well to the touch.\

STUPID question time. Should the lower hose really be that much cooler? Did I do such an awesome job that the colling system is working that much more efficiently? Thermo cant be stuck beacuse I had plenty of heat in the car (chilly tonight here in KC).

Thoughts? Time to relax or do I need to look elsewhere.

[Sabrewings]

Is your car overheating? If not, it's working.

[diesan04]

Temp gauge reads fine. Right between the 1/4 and 1/2 way on the gauge. No alarms either. thanks!

[SyntheticShield]

It is the upper hose in which the coolant flows TO the radiator to be cooled and is pumped FROM the radiator to the engine via the lower radiator hose. So yeah, the lower one should be quite a bit cooler than the top one. Top hose is FROM the engine, bottom hose is TO the engine if that helps any.

[Zef_66]

My guess on the whole situation is one of two things happened:

1. You were low on coolant. The high temp spike was because of air due to low coolant. You re-filled with coolant, then flushed everything and re-filled with proper amount of coolant. All is well now.

2. Your t-stat stuck closed. Once it cooled down, it worked properly again and was just a fluke thing, but you need to change your t-stat to make sure it doesn't happen again.

So those are my guesses. Which one it was, if any, I don't know. But I would make sure you have a new t-stat in there, and full of coolant and if it doesn't happen again, don't worry about it.