It could but only if you are standing still for a long time at idle. Once the car is moving air is flowing over the radiator cooling the coolant. Once I had issues with my fans only running on high because of a temp sensor. I disconnected both of them and I never once overheated because I never let the car sit long enough to heat up. I wouldn't recommend running without fans especially now that the weather is getting warmer but I doubt it's what causing the major overheating issue that you are experiencing.But could that one fan not working cause overheating?
Turn on your A/C and you should see both fans coming on.one more thing. The fan on the drivers side is not working. We have never seen it work that is. Could this be causing more pressure or overheating?
Did you take it to someone that specializes in VW's? If he put the timing belt on a few teeth off he could've caused some serious damage. Although if the timing were off, generally it wouldn't start let alone run.Finally got our 2000 1.8 liter turbo beetle in the shop after replacing several hoses that kept blowing after idling a few minutes. Water pump was bad. Timing belt changed. mechanic said " it was off a couple T's" ?? What's that mean? He said its idling rough. We weren't experiencing that before. We did notice that there wasn't any power when driving up on trailer to take to mechanic. Now I'm worried there's a bigger issue or this guy has messed something up. We should know what they find tomorrow or Monday. Any thoughts?
The VW New Beetle has what is known as an "Interference Engine"We've been assured that this guy knows what hes doing and he does several vw's a week. As for what the place told us about the "t's " , he meant teeth. As in a " couple of teeth we're out" on the old belt. I asked if that would cause any major damage to the engine and he said no. It's running a little rough since its sat a while. Il hoping that's the Only reason. Weak power when pushing gas. Just started it to put it trailer to take it to shop. Before that, it ran fine. I'm worried something has messed up on motor since it overheated. We turned motor off as soon as we realized it was overheating that day. Only started while working on things and hasn't been driven since. The guy at shop is checking on why it's running rough now. They also found a small leak in radiator too.,ugh. I'm hoping this wasn't a $4000 mistake buying this bug. I hope you guys can give me some insight on what could be going on, what to expect and what to ask or accept from mechanic. Thanks