We just had the waterpump, thermostat housing, etc. replaced on our car. It runs fine with the exception of some mild surge while stopped at a traffic light from time to time as well as the hood getting very hot once we park it and the fan doesn't seem to run as long afterwards. We don't get a temp light but the CEL is on. I scanned it but there were no stored fault codes. I checked the fuse and it was good, I read on another thread that lead me to believe it could be a low speed fan resister but I'm not 100% certain of that. Anyone else encounter this situation before?

 

What temperatures does the coolant reach during engine operation and after shutdown? If the sensor (inside the thermostat housing) is defective, they may be reported lower than they actually are.

You can easily monitor coolant temperature from inside the "hidden menu":

 

Not sure on the temp, my scanner is supposed to show live data including features like that but it only shows engine rpm. I'll try the hidden menu though. Thanks.

 

Okay got a temp range finally. It keeping stable at 107-108 C, once it shot up to 113 then the fan kicked in high and dropped it back down.

 

107-108C (225F) is normal operating temp for these cars.

 

Okay thanks 🙂👍. I was noticing a pattern once I started monitoring it and was hoping that was the case. I'm used to V8 motors that are set in the 185 or so range.

 

185F is typical for engine cooling temperatures. Hotter operating temperatures increases the engine thermal efficiency. Direct injection engines can run hotter, since they have better control over the combustion process.

 

Direct injection is not a "pre-requisite": both turbo charged and non-turbo charged engines in the R56 have similar (if not identical) operating temperature ranges, even though the non-turbo charged engines (N12/N16) are not direct injection.

 

Thanks for clarifying!