I have heat!!! Soon as I bypassed that vsv and turned the engine on... boom! that lever got sucked soo far up it disappeared... much further than I could have ever pushed it up by hand... and took no more than 2 minutes once the sun was out... thanks for the help and advice once again Cre.. now I no longer need to endure muscle spasms in my lower back from shivering soo much... :redx:

Wow, that heat can start kickin some ass... finally gets to the point I have to lower my windows and let some heat out... even if I don't have the heater on, the warm air is still processed and pushed thru the vents...

Also, since I've bypassed the VSV, whenever I run my car at cold operating temp I get a gurgling sound that sounds like water falling in on itself thanks to air bubbles formed in the lines... I'm guessing this is the infamous "Waterfall" noise that typically comes from behind the firewall? I only hear it when I accelerate and only hear it when the engine is cold..

Apparently I have the wrong type of radiator cap for the sealed system and it does not want to suck fluid back from the reserve tank once pressures have decreased. This is what I was told, not what I observe. I observe the levels in my radiator and reserve tank to remain the same any time the car is cold. So as I'd like to believe the air bubbles are created from the contraction of water as it cools, I kind of feel that needs to be dismissed by the fact that the reserve tank doesn't horde, consume or contribute any extra fluid to the system..

Please refresh my memory... the 'waterfall' sound is indicative of a BHG? or could it be something to do with the heater core?

Waterfall is indicative of air in the coolant system; It does not in any way tell you where it is coming from.

The decrease or absence of the waterfall sounds once the car is warm is either due to the coolant expanding to the point that the air can be and is pushed out of the system via the radiator cap or it is being whipped into the coolant and as such simply doesn't exists in large enough pockets for you to hear the coolant trying to push past it.

If you don't trust the radiator cap, get it tested. ;) If you replace it, test the new one. Toyota only sells two different types of cap for the MKIII, they work a little differently but the both behave the same way. The only other difference is the mount and sealing area.

So should I be concerned about the waterfall thing? I have that noise too at start-up and then I believe it's usually gone. Everything works fine, the car runs and boosts like it should, I do notice that I have to fill up the coolant reservoir about once a month or so. I do notice a couple of drops of what appears to be coolant after I turn off the car, just haven't had time to see where that is coming from. Thanks for the info.

If there's a leak find it and fix it.