HI fellow neon owners...I don't own one but my freind does...I just want to know what you think the problem his here...Yesterday me and my freind was riding with his car (95 2.0L sport neon) and his temp idle went trough the roof...We parked the car and check his engine..cold..i mean i never saw a cold engine like this..i could put my hands on the exhaust manifold, valve cover...everything was cold....and we beat the shit of the car....then the temp gauge came back to normal...we took his car back to his house and then the needle gows up again.we parked the car again but this time smoke was comming out of the engine...what could be wrong with his car..i know it could be lots of things but i jsut need your opinion...
btw does a talon 2.0L head fits on his block?

sounds like you over heated the engine ,the manifold was cold because it was the intake,its plastic. the reason the gauge went crazy was the temp sensor is made to sense 'water' temp not steam. the white smoke is from a blown head gasket. let this be a lesson for everybody.. when a car overheats due to lack of fluid you will not get heat from the heater core, shut the car down and let it cool

Hmm. I've seen this before and it's usually a dead t-stat, low fluid, or a blown headgasket. The headgasket has probably been changed for the updated MLS gasket by now, so that's probably not the problem. I'm voting for a bad t-stat. If you overheated the engine, I hope you didn't do any permanent damage. :o

BTW, you know the exhaust manifold is on the firewall-side of the engine, right?

And the Talon head will bolt up to the Neon engine IF it's a 420A head. The problem (I THINK!) is that the heads are actually different, and nothing else from the Neon will bolt up, intake and exhaust manifolds, etc. But I could be wrong about that.

thanx guys...my freind brought it to the mechanic and it was the t-stat...and I didn't know the exhaust mani was on the firewall side..i guess i'm just used to see them in front..anyways. thanx for your inputs