[Tim Walsh]

I had something similar happen to me in my olds. The drain plug blew out leaving me stranded. I got the engine REALLY hot before I noticed. Long story short, a new drain plug fixed the immediate problem, but I had to replace the thermostat and the intake gaskets before it ran right. I then drove it for another year before it I traded it in on the GTI. I believe this was because I used the wrong type coolant creating a sludge. I had several mechanics note that the heads/head gaskets are pretty tough on these motors. One thing I was also told was that the coolant system is convoluted and takes awhile to bleed all the air out. It took about 2 weeks before all the bubbles worked their way out.

BTW this was on a 96 with the 3.1L V6.