Went through the same scenario on mine. It doesn't make sense that the thermostat could cause this but.. it did. seems the computer wants to run everything. And you will remove some skin changing the thermostat. If you don't, you didn't do it right. Also the 'permanent nti Freeze" is only good for about 5 years, and it needs to be changed out. That made things run a bit cooler when I changed mine.

 

Upon leaving work this evening, my temp gauges didn't read, but no CEL code. I will be expecting it tomorrow upon leaving for work. I'll get up early because I have to clean up an oil spill where the oil filler neck came off while I was installing my new intake hose last weekend. So between oil clean up, oil change, temp sensor, thermostat, and a full on flush, my next two days off being Sunday and Monday, I will be quite busy. But it's regular maintenance that needs to be done, so I don't feel so bad. I think I'll grab some UV dye and see about the oil leak on the "front" of the engine. I noticed a significant amount of residual oil there while I was putting the air filter hose on. So it's time to find out what the deal is. Just crossing my fingers that it's not the timing cover. That's all for tonight. Bed time.

 

Usually the oil on the front is from the oil sending unit , if you mean the passenger side end , it’s the crankshaft/harmonic balancer seal.

 

Yeah, passenger side is what I was meaning. Already fixed the oil sending unit. The oil pan is seeping ever so slightly that'll need attention as well. Ill have to lookup the difficulty ratingfor the balancer/crankshaft seal. Thanks for the info.

 

The balancer seal is fairly easy to change, I will advise you the GM seal is superior to the other brands .

A good bit of information in this thread

https://www.chevyhhr.net/forums/prob...leaking-46834/

 

And in this one

https://www.chevyhhr.net/forums/gene...-advice-61278/

 

I think RockAuto sent me the wrong thermostat. Am I imagining this or is the new one wrong!?!? WTF?!?

New one from RA

one from RAut 2

RA

One that came out 2

One that came out 3

One that came out

One that came out 4

One that came out 5

 

Does that box have a part number printed on it? 131-158 ? Does it have 180 stamped on it?
the new one appears to be correct but I’ve never seen professional printed on any I’ve installed.

 

Yes and yes.
I tried to install it to see if I was doing something wrong, and, uh yeah, it was me!!
The first time I tried it didn't seem to fit, that's when I freaked out and wrote that post. Got a hold of a friend and he said that there may have a redesign since the one I pulled out. I verified on RockAuto the picture matches what I got.
Second attempt to install it went in nice and easy. Put some distilled water in the system because I'm not wasting good antifreeze on a screw up....well it leaked at the housing.
Pulled it back apart and realized that the gasket from the old one was still on there, damn, my bad.
Third attempt. Got everything cleaned off and tightened down, NO LEAKS!!!!!
Topped it off with more distilled water and drove her home. It was semi-rush hour traffic, stop-n-go you know. I had the digital gauge up on the dash to keep an eye on it. It did get a little warmer than normal but that could be from using water vs antifreeze. Any thought?
I plan on draining the system this evening and refilling with proper 50/50. Hopefully this will eleviate the higher than normal temperature.
When I say higher than normal I mean +210f

 

Burp the coolant, don’t use distilled water. Use 50/50 Dexcool and potable water