That Water Thermostat Conversion Kit From Ricambio.

[banjomandolin]

Hi,
   I joined you lot 4 weeks ago and after much trying have now managed to overcome the "Username Password obstacle".
              I bought my Bis in Mar. '05 and. before purchase, gave it a test drive round the block. Everything worked well except the oil pressure light which flickered continually. Of course the owner maintained that it was a poor electrical connection. When I removed the engine and stripped it down I found that the front crankshaft main bearing had split across it's circumference and the oil pressure was being dissipated back into the sump. So off I did go to Leicester to see a donor car advertised for £50 "having a good engine". I bought the car and transplanted the engine. The engine has proved perfect in every way. The rest of the car is also fine except for the front end cosmetics. I like doing the mechanicals but I am hopeless at bodywork.
               Does anybody have experience of Ricambio's water thermostat convertion kit.? I have removed the thermostat from my engine for the usual reason but don't fancy running without a thermostat in winter because of the obvious anticipated poor heater performance.
John Clark

[fiatfsm]

save your cash, leave your thermostat out and buy a good blanket

[Chris Lakin]

Ive seen a couple of headgaskets go even with these conversion kits, get a standard thermostat in, and just make sure you clean the limscale and corrosion out every two years in the thermostat housing use corrosion inhibitor and plenty of coolant changes, your head gasket will never go, when the thermostat housing gets blocked up with all the crap over the years of poor maintenance it cant open, mine was like this and many other people i have spoken to said the same, and if your headgasket does go, make sure you replace the gasket with a copper one, you really cant go wrong.

Welcome to the club John

regards

Chris