Chevy Impala Overheating and Shut Off

My 2006 Chevy Impala I’ve been overheating due to a radiator leak and we put stop leak and in on the drive home it started to over heat and then everything shut off. Lost all power. Key stuck and gears locked. plz help.

ANSWER: Sounds like you have more than one problem.

Stop can work sometimes to fix a small radiator leak, but can also cause other problems. It can actually plug up coolant passages inside the engine and radiator causing coolant to not flow properly. The radiator leak could have been caused by another problem that was making the engine overheat. When an engine overheats it causes high pressure in the cooling. system. This can cause a weak are of the system to start to leak- like a radiator. So the radiator may not have been the original problem. Possible something as simple as a bad thermostat could have been the problem, or coolant fans that were not working. If your Impala has the 3400 engine, these are known for the rear head gasket going bad as well. You can read some more info on Impala overheating.

The fact that the engine shut off and you cannot get the key out could be a few things as well. Is the battery dead? Does the engine crank? If the battery is dead, you will not be able to get the key out of the ignition. If the battery is fine then you could have a problem in the shifter release solenoid for a floor shift car. See this link for Chevy Impala shifter stuck. This page has a link to pictures on how to fix the problem.

First check if the battery is dead. If it is not and the engine still wont crank over, then worst case scenario is that it overheated so bad that the engine is not damaged. Possible locked up.

If you car has the 3800 engine, then you may have gotten lucky that the upper intake is leaking internally to the engine and caused what is called “Hydro Lock”. This is where coolant gets into the cylinder because of the intake manifold has cracked and caused the engine to lock up hydraulically- a liquid cannot be compressed, so the engine wont turn over. See this link for 3800 hydro lock.

So basically you are going to have to have an auto mechanic look at it to determine what is the original problem and what damage is now occurring.

Themostat And Sensor Overheating

I went to get a simple oil change and l asked the mechanic to look at my A/C cause its not working. He gave me an oil change and said that he had to recharge the a/c and use dye to find out if I needed a new compressor. A day later my engine light is on. l go back to the guy he says my engine is overheating because l need a new coolant temperature sensor & thermostat housing w/sensor. I go get a second opinion at a different shop.

The mechanic there tells me that l do need a new thermostat unit but also that my radiator overflow tank is full of oil and what looks like dye which caused it to fail. What should l do. l think the first mechanic botched the job and dumped dye in my radiator tank. Its full to the top with gunk. I just had a tune up in January and a engine & transmission flush last june. No way should it look like this. Now l cant even drive my car until its fixed. What should l do??

ANSWER: I do not see any way that the A/C dye could have been put in the cooling system. A/C dye must be pumped in using the A/C gauges and cannot get to the cooling system in any way.

It is possible that the first mechanic also put dye in the radiator cooling system because he saw it was low or saw a leak. Dye cannot cause the thermostat to fail. If the coolant is full of gunk, it is not dye. The orange coolant in GM vehicles has a tendency to cause this brown goo.when it is old or never changed before.