please help

[mickydodge1990]

My truck only gets hot after I shut it off then cools off as soon I I turn it back on and drive. Heater core?? Water pump?? Bad radiator cap?? There is no coolant coming from anywhere

[iranch]

Heat after shut down

How hot is hot. All engines gain a little heat after shut down, coolant stops flowing and residual heat raises the temp. In this era of electric gauges and aluminum you never notice it. When mechanical gauges and cast iron ruled you could sit and watch it rise. If it isn't blowing water out when you shut down I wouldn't worry about it.

Dennis

[mickydodge1990]

hot enough

It gets hot enough that its harder to start almost in the red

[iranch]

I don't know what to tell you.

It could be lots of things. I cured the hot start problem on my 77 with a better radiator but it would overheat, pulling loads, never empty. Timing advanced to far will do it. On our old tractors, a weak battery or to small of battery cables makes restarts tough. Dodge starters are usually either good or shot but it's possible yours could be going out.

You might have to do a little tinkering to find the problem.

Dennis

[mickydodge1990]

hmmff

The truck only gets hot when I shut her down not when running. Load or no load

[n1265]

Cant see how it could be the heater core,

Could be a bad cap if you are loosing coolant
( evaporating out ) Don't check it by the overflow tank, wait till it cools then look into the radiator. If it keeps going down try replacing the cap.

That leave the water pump and thermostate...

[MoparFreak69]

Its not really a case of your truck getting hotter after you shut it off, rather its a case of the heat that is in the combustion chambers prior to shutting it down are not being radiated out. That heat is soaking through the block on its way out. There really isnt anything you can do about it, nor should you worry too much about it, as long as it doesnt get too hot while running and the fluid level doesnt change.
You could go out and buy and install an electric water pump that would keep the water circulating even when the engine is shut off, but then without an electric fan the radiator would have no way to shed the heat so you are not improving much without doing both. Installing both an electric water pump and an electric cooling fan will solve your issue, but the big thing is its really just an issue, not a problem.
Something else to keep in mind, those old gauges were never very accurate, and their reading range is rather short. Hot on your gauge is probably in the 220 degree range. Chevy has motors that they run well over 230 degrees all the time. Apparently from other discussions on here a lot of diesel manufacturers are going that route as well.
If you are truly concerned about it find a well built, accurate, and reliable water temperature gauge that reads up to at least 250 degrees. Find an unused port on the cooling system and install it. You will probably have to do some custom adapting because I dont know of many gauges like that made to fit an application like this. When you get it set up go for a drive, get it nice and warmed up then find a place and shut it down. Watch the gauge for a while, it can take 30-40 minutes before the heat is fully soaked through the block and the temp actually begins to radiate out into air. Check on the gauge every so often and just track what the temperature actually is doing. I would be willing to bet that its probably only getting up to the 210-220 degree range, which is perfectly acceptable for pretty much any engine built after the 50's.

[DODGEBOYS]

either your starter is shot or you are over heating [ almost ] that the heat soak is causing the hard start

[712edf]

Do you still have the gear reduction type starter? (I'm not sure what yours came with.) I hear the mini starters do better.

Bucky

[Don Williams]

I rebuilt a 360 for my 73 PW once upon a time. It did exactly what you describe for about the first year of operation. I attributed it to the engine being nice and tight after the rebuild. The problem lessened as I put miles on the engine.

Starting the truck cold was really no different that before the rebuild. After driving and getting up to temperature and then shutting down was a different story. The heat soak would raise the coolant temperature almost to but not into the red zone. Upon starting the temperature would quickly come back down to normal. The truck never overheated while driving. A good battery and good starter were required for starting when the engine was hot.