Robert,

It has been pointed out many times, several times in this thread, and
hundreds more in the past, that the needles can be highly variable and
inaccurate.

Before you start adding oil coolers or paying for new parts, get a
infrared thermometer device and point it at a number of parts of the
engine to determine if it is really hot, or is just giving you a too
high reading.  Monitor it as it is heating up from cold and while
running to get an idea of how hot different points are.

For years, I used to worry about this in my old 84 when it would read
pretty high and the fan would run a lot while in stop and go traffic.
Once I got the infrared and took some measurements and found out it was
doing just fine.  The fan would come on and lower the coolant
temperature just fine.

It doesn't take much fan time with the fan running to lower the
temperature 20-30 degrees.  Get some real data on the issue.

And as several people have said check the thermostat, even if it is
new.  And before putting a new one in, check the old one in a pot of
water on the stove, and if it is bad, check the "new" one before
installing it to make sure it is good.

Sam

--
Sam Walters
Baltimore, MD

89 Syncro GL, Zetec Inside
85 Westy Weekender
85 Mercedes Benz 300D Turbodiesel - to become veggie oil powered

All incoming and outgoing email scanned by
automatically updated copy of Norton AntiVirus.