loosing water, thermostat not opening

[dubslug]

when filling it up should thermostat be open or closed??
would need more water if open??

[Conker]

You have to fill up from cold, otherwise you would have to run the engine with no/little coolant to try and get the thermostat to open... Unless you are flushing the system first, in which case the thermostat could technically be open when you refill, if you do it quick enough.

Fill it up cold and then follow the usual bleeding procedure until the thermostat opens, at which point the level will prob drop and you'll need to keep topping it up.

Squeezy squeezy pipe time   .

[dubslug]

nice on cheers thought that was the case

[sidecarphil]

what about a faulty presssure cap 

could be throwing coolant out cos of that

[dubslug]

its new vw one and blue....
was checked when h/g was changed a while ago

[sidecarphil]

cool just an idea , oftern overlooked 

[dubslug]

thanks, please feel free to offer as many ideas as u can, its new cap and resevoir..
i think the problem was down to thermostat as that definatly didnt open yesterday but after i re topped water up today it did, and there was no bubbling inside the resivoir

regards

[rubjonny]

coolant faq, have a read thru it it takes you thru how to test every aspaect of coolign system and proper method to bleed.  its in the mk2 faq atm, ive asked for it to be moved but its not happened as of yet!