Water Temp problems, Somebody please answer

[davvpar]

I have an 84 VW gti rabbit and when im driving the temp gauge on the dash goes straight to hot within a few minutes and the celcius gauge is at 85-100, i changed the thermostat, waterpump, temp swith and nothing what the hell is going on.

[zagrot]

are you sre that you did not install the thermostat backward? the copper cylinder on the thermostat should face the water pump housing, not toward the radiator. how long does the temp gauge stay in the 85- 100 deg. range? does the engine temp ever drop?

[davvpar]

The celcius gauge goes to 100 and stays there and only if i let of the clutch the engine temp on the dash goes down to just before hot.

[zagrot]

so, when the engine is allowed to idle the temp drops. did you remove a large spring from the lower radiator hose? if so put it back, it keeps the hose from collapsing when the water pump is trying to pull a lot of water from the radiator. also check your belt tension. one sign of a slipping belt is the pulley that it is slipping across will become very hot, sometimes they squeel, sometimes they don't. tension the belt per the repair manual's instructions, don't be tempted to use the "i'll show you method," i once ruined an otherwise good a/c compressor bearing that way, on the interstate, and four hours from home (i had alternator belt problems before i took the trip and ended up doing the whole job over again at two in the morning, fortunately, because of liberal use of engine oil, the bearing rattled along for two thousand more miles refore going totaly kaput).

[termitesgraffix]

Sounds to me like your thermostat is closed off... or backwards as zagrot said. The spring side should face up into to block and the side that usually has an arrow and said "water" (aftermarket non-OEM parts) points down. That is choice number one.
Two: once your car gets hot, reach down and disconnect your radiator fan((((carefully)))) feel the radiator, is it hot all over? if not... then where it is cold, you have aclog.
Three: Water pump not pumping anymore. Open the overflow tank cap (BEFORE THE CAR IS HOT) and see if anything is squirting back into the bottle through the thin tube on the top. Usually this is flowing. Specially if there is alot of fluid in there.
Four: And I hope this isn't it... Somone didn't disconnect their AC pump and put a shorter belt to just the alternator did they now??? make sure there is in fact a belt going to the water pump.

MORE: Car takes long to warm up... (thermostat stuck open and coolant not able to settle long enough to get warm. this also causes it to always be hot, once hot since it is not able to settle in the radiator to be cooled off.)
Car warms up too fast... this is your issue at hand...