Engine over heating and loosing water

DezUk · 6 May 2006 at 10:46

Well i noticed the other night that my car was loosing water, seems to be coming from the radiator on the drivers side underneath the car. Got home last night and had to top the car up quite a bit and monitored it as it dribbled out (not a lot i must admit) but the water did seem to be oily

I am hoping the oliy look is just the anti freeze but im not sure yet. I think there could be a lot of air trapped in the cooling sytem and i need to try and find the bleed valve to free it so i can top the system up fully with water. I can then keep an eye on things and see whats what. My worst fear is a cracked head but thats the last resort. The last job the car done on it was a new metal water pump so its possible the garge just hasnt tightned up one of the hoses on the cooling system or one of them is split.

I'm up for suggestions though but for now i need to know where the bleed valve is, anyone know ?

The engine only gets hot when its idling when on the move it seems to be fine and one other thing i noticed is the air con doesnt seem to blow any cold air at all i don't know if this is anything to do with it.

rG-tom · 6 May 2006 at 10:52

sorry to hear that mate. This is off topic but i was trying last night to find some pictures of your car, and other than your sig i couldnt. Do you have any online mate? It's a fantastic example.

Sorry if it's the wrong time to ask :X

Cheers,

Tom.

agw_01 · 6 May 2006 at 10:53

If the engine gets hot when the car is stood still, check that the radiator fan comes on when the temp starts to rise. If not, check connections to the fan and from the radiator's temperature sensor.

If you're going to get a new radiator, get a new fan just to be on the safe side. I know just how easy it is for an engine to overheat when it gets absolutely no cooling whatsoever.

When you say the water was oily, did it run down any panels of the car before hitting the floor, or did it drop straight onto the floor? I wouldn't worry about it tbh. I've seen water spew out of the top of my expansion tank and onto the floor, where it was full of pretty patterns. At first I poo'd myself, but it turned out to be spilt oil and road grime on different parts of the engine bay which contaminated the water before it got to the ground.

If the car still starts and runs, you won't have cracked your head. Even the K series didn't suffer from cracked heads, and if it did, you'd know about it. How much did the engine overheat before you turned it off?

DezUk · 6 May 2006 at 11:28

Well the fans come on when the engine starts to get hot so no problems there. When idling the temp just starts to rise and i think it would just go off the temp scale if i let it but i just turned the engine off and let it cool back down to a normal postion on the needle.

The water seems to be dripping directly from the bottom of the radiator but im not 100% as it was last night when i was looking under the car so i dont know if its hitting any panels i'll look out for that today.

You can find some pics of my car over here..

http://www.theinflux.co.uk/photos/thumbnails.php?album=7