I took a trip to Pennsylvania to see my best friend get married last summer. It was the most beautiful wedding I have ever seen. On the way back I had to sit in traffic in the middle of New York City and while sitting in traffic the temperature gauge kept rising and I didn’t know what was happening at first so I panicked and pulled off the next exit I saw and pulled into McDonald’s parking lot right off the exit. I sat for a moment, unsure of what to do. Was I able to drive home, which was another five hours away? Did I have to wait it out, for how long? I had no idea. All I knew is that my car was definitely tired and needed to rest for at least a few minutes. The weird part was, I could drive my car without the temperature gauge rising as long as I was actually driving – the second I got stuck in the smallest bit of traffic was when the temperature gauge would start to rise again. Eventually after waiting it out for a short while, I decided to get back on the road and see what happens; if I had to keep pulling over here and there, so be it, was my thought process. I ended up making it home and took my car to the mechanic the next morning – turns out, my car was low on engine coolant and my car was overheating. I had no idea and I had never checked it prior to this happening in the four years I had owned the car. The mechanic topped off my coolant and just told me to keep an eye on it. Thankfully it was nothing more serious because that could’ve been a very expensive fix.
The different types of thermostats