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Looking at the Lancer today I've found an issue with coolant flow, I thought the thermostat wasn't opening so I've replaced it today and refilled with coolant, I ran it in and couldn't get any decent temp on the return hose.
The feed was noticeably hot, but the return cold. The fans were running fast.

This has been an ongoing issue and I reckon has been affecting FE - the fans appear to spend a great deal of time running to me.

I made the coolant mixture stronger (50/50) instead of 33%, and similar results.

Today going for a drive I decided to stop pulse and gliding and instead keep the rpms to speed and this appeared to be bringing the temperatures down (noticed on the gauge the temp was down).

The theory is, when I pulse and glide, during the pulse the coolant flows fairly well, but the glide causes the timing belt driven water pump to spin too slowly to get the flow required and so the fans run a lot more often then they probably need to.

Q 1: What's going to be more efficient to use - fan electrical energy or pulse and glide?
Q 2: What solution exists to this problem?
I don't want the head overheating to the point it warps, but likewise there's little point in having the fans running if the thermostat hasn't opened (feeling the return hose it's not very hot, but low flow would also do that).

I'm looking closely at the sensor too - I had the car off and checked the temperature sensor with a multi meter and it's reading 0.08 to 0.10 kOhm, so the manual says 0.26 - 0.36 would be around 80 deg C - I left it some time - around 15 minutes or more, and it's dropped to 0.13 to 0.15 kOhm - not a great drop in temp, would it be ?