64 C10 overheating problem

[elane352]

Hello!

I have had two occurrences whereby the pressure in my block has blown off the entire lower radiator hose, or the top portion of the lower radiator house. So I want to see how I can avoid that happening in the future. Any insight would be appreciated.

Givens
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• 64 Chevy C10 pickup
• Formally a 6 cylinder; now has a 350 crate motor in it (installed during May)
• Champion aluminum radiator with shroud and an electric fan – 1,600 CFMs (installed during July)

1st overheating occurrence – blew the entire lower hose off – August time frame
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• After driving the truck about 40 minutes during a hot summer day, when I parked it and turned off the ignition, the hose blew off.
• After letting it cool down for about 2 hours, got a new hose, put it on, put in antifreeze, and ran the truck (idling it) for about 10 minutes.
• The fan never came on and I noticed that lower radiator hose was not hot.
• That made me think the thermostat was not opening and maybe the spewing antifreeze has messed with the fan wiring since the fan was working beforehand.
• I had the truck towed home.
• I got a new thermostat that opened at about 165 degrees. I also checked the fan wiring and made sure it taped into my painless auxiliary fuse block. Things were working again. The fan was coming on and the lower radiator hose was getting warm.

2nd overheating occurrence – blew the top part of the lower hose off – happened on October 16th.
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• I was driving the truck back from North Carolina to Maryland (5 hour drive).
• About 45 minutes from home, I hit a stretch of a lot of stop lights. I noticed the temperature gauge needle going up. I pulled over for about 20 minutes to let things cool down.
• Got back on the road and got to the point on the interstate where I was 15 minutes from home. Since I hit standstill traffic, I got off the interstate. Shortly afterwards, the temperature gauge needle went down to 0.
• I immediately pulled over to a parking lot.
• Stopped the truck, turned off the ignition, and opened the hood.
• Then the top portion of the lower radiator hose blew off.
• I had the truck towed home again.

Questions
• Do I need a new thermostat? If so, what is the best one to get?
• What about the temperature gauge going down to zero? Is it toast now? And what caused that? It looks like it is still wired up and the wire does not look to be fried or anything bad like that.
• What about the 1,600 cfm Champion fan? Is that high enough? Should I have gotten a dual fan set up? Has anyone had good/bad experiences with that type of fan?

Again, thanks for your time in reading this.

Sincerely,

Eddie