What happens when you continue to drive a car that's overheating?

Question

I had a leaky valve and my car overheated while I was driving because all of the coolant leaked out. I pulled over and shut off the car, but I was just wondering what would really happen if I had kept driving? I know it would cause major damage to the engine, but would the engine simply die? Would there be an explosion? Fire? What would happen?

People! Please read the whole question! My car is fine. I know what to do when a car overheats. I don't need advice. I just want an answer to my "what if" question. Thanks!

Answer 1

When an engine overheats, there are lots of things affected by that heat. Ultimately what YOU will notice is---->
1) Noise
2) Smell
3) Loss of power
4) Smoke (sometimes)
5) Finally, Complete failure and engine melt-down. It will die, and/or lock up.
When it gets this bad, yes, they CAN catch fire, though not always.

SAFETY NOTE----> Should you notice smoke from under the hood (or anywhere else) IMMEDIATELY find a place to pull over, turn the car off, and get out of the car.
DO NOT open the hood to see what it is.
When you open the hood, you VENTILATE the fire and you have now exposed yourself to very bad burns to your hands and arms, as well as your face.
It simply isn't worth the pain and dis-figurement to satisfy that curiosity.
There won't be much you can do to the fire anyway, so just let the car burn. Get away from it.
It is a major financial investment, yes, but not near the investment you will face with the hospital bills, the pain, the scars, AND the loss of the car if you get too close to the heat.

Answer 2

Here's the drill. Your engine will continue to run, but it will get hotter and hotter. At some point, it will begin losing power and eventually quit because it will become so hot that the fuel drawn into the engine will ignite before it's supposed to, causing what is known as "detonation", or "pinging". The excessive heat will cause damage to rubber and plastic parts, and can make the engine oil so thin that it no longer can protect against the friction between the moving parts of the engine. Those parts can "seize", or basically melt and bind so that the engine can no longer operate. Heat weakens metal, so things like cylinder bores and bearings wear much faster while the engine is overheated, causing excessive oil consumption later. Some metal parts can warp, causing permanent damage. There will be no explosion to speak of, but there is certainly the danger of a fire. A number of air-cooled Volkswagens over the years caught fire when there wasn't sufficient airflow or the air temperature was too high to effectively cool the engines. It's not the actual engine that catches fire, but the plastic, rubber, and non-metallic components under the hood that burn. Not to mention fuel and oil that are highly flammable. Truly, you would have to drive the car without coolant for quite a while to damage it, which is why you need to keep an eye on the gauges or the idiot lights and stop when they indicate a problem.

Answer 3

Car Engine Overheating

Answer 4

The radiator has coolant that flows through it and the coolant goes through parts of the engine to cool the oil which lubricates the engine, when the oil temperature gets too high some of the internal moving parts of the engine will Begin to melt or bend, causing it to come to a violent stop, kinda like shooting off a cannon in a small metal room with thick metal walls, so maybe depend on each engine on whether an explosion or what, probably just a loud thud or screech and some smoke. . ultimately the engine will suffer major damage, in some cases you may need an entire new engine. You were smart to pull over!

Answer 5

I've been in a car when the engine overheated and had about the worst thing possible happened. The engine simply quit running and would not even crank over. No explosion or fire or anything, but inside the engine had some major damage. Pistons sized to the cylinder walls, bent connecting rods, and other severe, expensive damage.

Answer 6

The block could warp and /or crack and the engine would be beyond repair and not even good for a core charge reimbursement towards getting a rebuilt replacement, or you could blow a head gasket which would take around $800.00 to repair. Mist likely there would be no explosion or fire unless you had a fuel leaking on the hot engine. If there was any coolant left and the head gasket blows you would get a white water vapor that would look like smoke.

Answer 7

You engine would get so hot it would lock up. I have seen cars ketch on fire, from the heat the engine produces. I had this happen to me. I stopped and got gas, everything was fine. In 10 miles my engine started pinging and stopped, water and oil sprayed all over under the hood, all because of a dumb temperature light sending unit. This sending unit did not work with out water,. It cost me $1,400.00 for a new engine. This was in 1979. I installed gage's after this. This was caused by a small half moon shaped cut in the bottom radiator hose. about the size of a pencil eraser. So you did the right thing by stopping.

Answer 8

The engine will over heat, causing the piston size to increase and therefore they won't be able to go up and down in the cylinder. In other words the engine won't be able to rotate anymore and it will stop the rest of the power train. It is very unprobable that you see a fire. But you would probably see some white-blue smoke due to engine oil getting into the cylinders.

Answer 9

Overheating an engine will cause internal component damage and often sieze or lock up. It damages head gaskets and on aluminum heads can melt, crack, or warp the heads. They usually require a complete over-haul job.....if they can be freed after siezing. Hope this answered your "what ifs".

Answer 10

Well, It wouldnt really kill the car completely, or make it blow up or catch fire, it would just contiune to over heat, causeing a little damage to the car. Nothing really major. Now, what you do next time if your car overheats is turn on the heater on your car, it will help the car actually cool down! I know it sounds fishy, but it works trust me! Ive tried that once before and it worked great! So remember that, when your car over heats, turn on the heater! Just another small life lession!