Car not warming up....

[Khare]

I thought quarter was normal  Only very rarely in traffic mine goes to half 

is this normal?

maybe your stat is stuck open. Half is normal temp.

[Cosworth Lee]

have you done the stat yet? guessing you have PAS then

one thing you could also change is the water temp sensor. im not sure on the gti, but most cars like this it will be screwed into the block near the stat.

[2pac]

unless you have PAS fitted of course, then its NOT a 5 minute job as described 

It when u have a car with aircon, then its a real bugger, you can gurantee what ever u want to do an aircon pipe will be in the bloody way!

well i have aircon and nothing stays in the way- it's still a 5 minute job.

the catch is how to hold the stat and rubber in place until you put the cover.
when i took out me hand it kept falling several times until i succeeded.

[danny_p]

 iccel tiny bit of sillicon grease holds the rubber,    or just take the water pump off and do it or for the price of them fit a new water pump at the same time

[JMallows]

Silly question probably, but does it matter if the car doesnt get hot? Surely its a good thing if it runs a little cooler, the only problem i can think of is that you wont get heat in the car? Or am i missing something!?

[Jay]

I think it's more to getting the oil warm and keeping it at the right temp to help with lubrication, cold oil is not as (for lack of words after a few beers) soft/runny as warmer oil. If that makes sense 

[AdamMk2]

I think our scientific word may be viscous or Mobile  hahaha

[danny_p]

enignes are quite presise bits of kit with specific tolerances,   materials expannd and contract with changes in tempriture, so when an enigne is built everthing is worked out so the clearances are correct at it's desinged operating tempriture also engines run more efficently when they are hot 

[kittie]

Mine sits at the first mark and raises to the middle in traffic. Oil indicates (or did before the MFA broke) as normal temps.

I've always thought this was due to my having a duff stat. Have had one from VW for about hmmm... 18 months at least (I have PAS).

One day!  :embarassed:

[Lap]

Sounds similar to mine. My oil temp was normal and heating worked etc but the water temp gauge never went past the first mark.

In the end, it turned out to be a faulty sender. Now it sits in the middle with normal use and rises up to 2/3 when stuck in traffic.