1992 325i cooling issue - ride lights not working

[palemoon]

Hi,

I recently acquired a 1992 325i and it has a couple of issues I need to sort.

First, my temp gauge stays at about the 11 o'clock position in town, but drops into the blue at highway speeds. I suspect a sticking thermostat. Someone on another forum/blog told me this is normal for E36s, but I don't agree. I believe it has the original cooling system parts (i.e. plastic). So, should I try a new thermostat, or is there something else I should be looking at?

Second, my right side park/tail lights and the license plate lights are not working. The light assemblies have tested good, the fuses are good as well. Looking at the wiring diagram for this car, I see that all of these lights go through the K25 relay. So, I suspect a bad relay or faulty wire. My question is, where is the K25 relay located? Someone said it's behind the dash, but "where" behind the dash?

Thanks for any help with this.
Ed

[96_323]

Hi, have you checked the coolant level in the system? A low level of coolant can cause the car to not get up to operating temp properly, if thats ok then try bleed the system. The original cooling system tended to fail in the plastic neck of the return pipe attached to the radiator, the waterpump itself or else the rubber pipes would tear and the most common sympton would generally be overheating.
Did you test the voltage on the lights? Not to sure about a K25 relay but there should be a fuse box behind the kick panel on the drivers side footwell, im not to certain though.

[quote="96_323"]Hi, have you checked the coolant level in the system? A low level of coolant can cause the car to not get up to operating temp properly, if thats ok then try bleed the system. The original cooling system tended to fail in the plastic neck of the return pipe attached to the radiator, the waterpump itself or else the rubber pipes would tear and the most common sympton would generally be overheating.