o/t- cherokee water temp.? normal?

I put 2 gallons of antifreeze in it, couldn't get anymore in it before I started it.

Ran engine for a little bit then shut off and put more antifreeze in it (noticed that the temp peaked up over 230 just before i shut it off after only 5 minutes!!!)

Just sitting inside my shop with the rpm's held to 1200 rpm's for initial break-in, it will reach 200-205 degrees.

I have a new 180 degree thermostat with a new aluminum radiator (the old one was the better copper).

I feel as if the engine is running too warm for just sitting there running in the shop for a half hour at nighttime (65 degrees outside).

Can anyone give me a feel of what the normal temps should be?

I finally got lucky and all the air was worked out. I REALLY was lucky that I didn't overheat it and crack anything.

Some years back NAPA in our local town had a bunch of defective thermostats. I used a pan of water on the electric range to test the thermostats and found the new ones I had were way off. I watched the temp. rise on a thermometer and the ones I got were more than 10 deg. off. They shipped the whole batch back and I went to Fisher Auto parts and got a good one. It can happen.

When you drain all the coolant out of them it is very difficult to get all the air out of the cooling system. I found that filling it with the thermostat housing off helps, the put it on and finish filling it. I also squeeze the hoses as it runs to warm up to push air out too, and I usually get some.

There were two radiators available for these, one single core, one dual core. I bought mine new and it came from the factory with a single core. I had cooling problems with it for years. Put in a dual core and it made a world of difference. It has a 192 thermostat and I can watch the temp gage move with the thermostat opening and closing now.

I don't think that the aluminum radiator is the cause of your problems.

A radiator is nothing more than a heat exchanger. Every air conditioner and heat pump made in the past 30+ years has two aluminum heat exchangers on it, one condenser coil, one evaporator coil. If aluminum was that much of a problem, I doubt they would use it there either.

Did you use the right water pump? If your have a serpentine belt, it uses a reverse direction water pump. If it has a v-belt it uses a regular water pump.

The water pump is new and all the hoses are new and all the lines are clear, block and head have been cleaned.

It"s 100% new.

I did a 302 for my truck a few years ago. Couldnt keep it cool. Come to find out there was a tiny piece of something on the carburator base and when I torqued it down put a hairline crack in the throttle body.