After working about ten hours a day, every day except Sunday, for the past two weeks I finished installing my new LE 1 heads and cam in my 94 Z about an hour ago. I crossed my fingers and started the car one hour ago and it started right up on the second try. Praise God! Everything runs good and sounds great except the coolant fans aren't coming on and so I had to shut the engine off as I watched the temp get up close to the red.

The fans are hooked up and I know that the coolant sensor in the LHS head is in and I made sure everything else on the harness (except the two a/c plugs which isn't going back in) was plugged in. I figure that before digging in there it might be a lot easier to ask for any suggestions while I wait for the temp to go down.

And by the way, my a/c delete pulley fits the stock belt just fine.

 

I didn't know this topic would be that uninteresting.

But an update: the fans ARE coming on, it looks like I just cut the engine off too soon as the temp went up. I don't think I've ever seen the temp go that high but the fans are coming on and the temp is going down as it should. Fortunately my dad is here and informed me that the fact that I have water in there as the coolant may be why it's so high. Apparently water doesn't dissipate heat as well as antifreeze. Surprises me.

I'm about to drive it anyway, I'll let anyone who might happen to read the post know how it goes.

 

Probably an air pocket. Common occurance. Bleed the system well.

 

yea u gotta run a mixture of antifreeze and water... watter dosent take heat like antifreeze. put some in there asap

i reprogramed my fans to turn on at a lower temp, matched with a lowtemp thermo and an electric waterpump it cools down real quick wile moving or with fans on.

 

Thanks. I thought I had all or most of the air out of there but maybe not. It surprises me that an air pocket could cause the temp to go so high before the fans kick on.
That's very interesting about programming the fans to turn on at a lower temp. I wonder why they have to be programmed to turn on when they ought to. The temp in my car never went that high before I did this job. But I also never had water in there as the coolant (which I did in case I had to drain it again due to a problem.) So the cause, assuming it's not some reaction to the new cam and heads or something I fouled up, must be either air pockets in there, or the fact that water is in there as the coolant. But it still doesn't add up to me, at least the water causing the fans to wait so long. It seems to me they should turn on at the same temp no matter what's in there.
Also, I just drove the car and it drives fine, but still, the temp is still sitting pretty high. About at the mark between the red and the middle mark, which I think is about 230 or so... and then, the fans only come on until the temp is down to a little below that mark, above middle mark.

 

Oh, and I'm filling it with antifreeze right now, letting some of the air bubble out. So if the temp situation goes back to normal we will know that the high temp was due to water as the coolant. Even though the cause and effect still wouldn't make sense to me.