phrocker

I've had a leak for five or six months. I have to refill my resevoir MAYBE once a month. I had a pressure test today and saw that the radiator was leaking toward the top part of the tank. I'm not bringing the car into the shop since that'll cost @400 ( parts and labor ). I can get a new radiator for 130 Tuesday. 1-800 radiator has 3 distribution points within a 4 hr radius, so that's an option, but since I'm leaving for DC next Friday ( driving there ) and I have finals this week, I'd like to hold off on the installation. I'm worried about using a leak control since I know they usually coat the inside of the cooling system, but I've heard bar's leak won't screw up your heater coil. Anybody use bar's leak with success? If I do go this route, would a coolant system drain help remove the remnants of the sealing compound? I think I can make the 900 mile drive with a bottle of spare coolant for safe keeping. In fact, I've driven 700 miles in a weekend w/o having to refill at all. knock on wood

I'm looking for some suggestions. The shop obviously wanted to do it right away. I want to kind of wait and see since the leak is so miniscule and only showed itself under 20 minutes of high pressure ( above what the stock cap causes )...and the resevoir, for some reason was above the max line. I'd like to wait until august, when I return from DC and have much more time to work on it...or worst case scenario, when I settle down in DC. Think bar's leak would do more harm than good?

jameswbl

where is the leak???

leaking at the tank??? the coolant tank?...the coolant tank is not suppose to be air tight...or is it leaking at the top of rad?

are you sure the engine is not burning coolant?

phrocker

it's at the top of the radiator. I'm not 100% certain it's not burning in the engine.

97BlackAckCL

iTrader: (6)

Def don't want air in there, but if; you're taht close to replacing the rad it shouldn't matter

972.2

haha 400 plus labor????? thats ridiculous. i had the same problem, bought a koyo off ebay for 100 shipped and put it in by myself in like a half hour. its really, really easy. im sure someone has the link for the koyo, i dont right now im not on my own computer.

Dan3952

Check your hoses first. My top hose had a split in it. At least it wasn't the bottom one that was the problem, if it was it would have been pissing all over the place. Not wanting to poison the neighbourhood cats, had the dealer flush and fill the coolant, they said it was quite dirty. There could have been sludge that had collected in the coolant passages that only power flushing would remove

TexasHonda

A radiator seam leak is likely manageable w/ additions of coolant. Just keep a jug of coolant in the car, check and top-up at each fill-up. Bars stop-leak won't work on a radiator seam (upper or lower end to cooling fins section)leak. It might seal a radiator fin leak, but the seam leak is too dynamic and involves considerable expansion/contraction from hot/cold. Stop leak has been known to block the heater element.

I would not drive w/ a leaking cooling hose. It's likely to get worse suddenly.

good luck

phrocker

Thanks for the info TexasHonda...I'll check the hoses too. As soon as it stops raining and I get some more time tomorrow, I'll make sure it's not a hose, and if it isn't I'll replace the radiator at first chance.