Wife was driving to work and had lots of white smoke come from under the hood. Found that there was oil in the radiator. Initially i thought a blown head gasket or cracked head, so i proceeded to look at the engine oil. After looking at the engine oil, it is NOT creamy color, nor full of water, but just normal looking oil. For as much oil as i saw mixed in the radiator and in the reservoir, i could help but wonder why the engine oil isn't low.

I proceeded to next check the tranny fluids and noticed that there was moisture on the tranny dipstick and at the very end was the milky creamy color oil as in the radiator.

Other than what i've been able to trace, the only culprit which i can find is the warmer, which appears to pass both water and oil. IS there anything else which i'm missing here which could cause the oil in the radiator water?

thanks...

 

Regular oil and tranny fluid are the two tha come to mind. You checked your oil and it's not low, and you checked your tranny fluid and it has the moisture on the stick and milky look on the tip of the stick. Sounds like somethings up with your tranny.

 

Try this troublshooting procedure:

http://www.ehow.com/how_7297919_trou...-radiator.html

 

based on the cooling diagrams from the service manual, the "warmer" is the only place where water and tranny oil could mix should there be a failure. I've looked up, down, and both sides, but nothing else stands out as the place where they would mix. I also did remove the tranny filler plug, and when i stuck my finger down in there, the same creamy gunk is there. So, it's really pointing to a crack or leak somewhere. As a side note, the car ran fine even when this issue occurred as wife was on the freeway and had to drive it off of free way. Starts, accelerates and shifts fine...

 

read the article NHB, but found that most of that seems to point to engine oil. However, i'm no mechanic and i could have read it too fast.

 

It sounds like you have established that the cross-contamination is probably taking place in the "warmer". So what are you asking?

 

thing is, i tested the warmer for a leak, i couldn't get it to leak. What i'm looking for is someone else's opinion of something else i may have missed.

 

When you say warmer, you are talking about the ATF line that runs thru the radiator right? I am not sure how to test it for leaks since its inside the radiator itself and you would have to replace or somehow clean out the radiator with the ATF line bypassed.

 

Hi Speed, the warmer on the 04 TL is actually not in the radiator, it's to the left of the fuse box on the tranny on teh right hand side. In looking through the TL service manual, you can see that the coolant system only interacts with the ATF at the warmer. I've put air pressure at the water inlets on the warmer, and i get nothing coming out from the AFT portion. I'm totally lost!!

 

the warmer is INTERNALLY leaking, so you are not going to see it "leak"


and as far as nothing coming out; was the warmer at "operating temp", if not you may not ever see it "leak/bypass"



and as far as driving the car DO NOT, you want to prevent any further damage, and intermixing of the fluids, so pick up a new warmer and put it on
then also pick up some tranny fluid, and coolant at the same time, to try and flush/clean out all of the exchanged fluids (the cooling system side, is not so much the worry, it's the tranny side that is the worry, with all of the small internal passages and such, you do not want those plugging up at all, or you be buying a transmission {and by the way it sounds it still drives fine, so hopefully it will stay that way}

 

friesm2000.... thanks for the info. We have a friend that owns a transmission shop, so monday we'll take the car via trailer to him, and have all the fluids changed, changed, and changed again. I"m not only going to replace the warmer, but also the base that the warmer sits on, the tranny filter and the radiator. About 4 years ago, we had a leak in the radiator that was patched, but now think it's time to really do it right and hopefully get another 3-5 years out of the car.

 

totally forgot about that , but yes indeed replace it also

and a modern radiator patched , does not happen very often, normally easier and faster to just replace it, but yes it would also not hurt to replace that either, considering the smaller passages in it, that like to plug up over time if the coolant is not changed regularly (and as said get rid of the patch work)

also may not hurt to do a thermostat either, not that expensive, and the system will already be drained, and considering you are already doing the warmer, the t/stat is right there also, and is only like two additional bolts to replace (and considering steam came out from under the hood; the coolant got hot enough for it to vaporize, so what says it did not impede the coolant flow; or even cause the warmer to internally leak with the coolant being too hot [since it would be going through the warmer instead of the radiator])









and as far as the trailer, hopefully you can pull/push it up onto it, instead of driving it on, again minimize any additional fluid exchange; but more then likely you won't notice a difference, and the driving it on probably won't do anything additional to the trans, but best to take as many precautions as possible though
so basically if driving it on, minimize the engine running, so try to line the trailer as much as possible so it is a straight shot onto it

 

Great advice here. X2 on the not driving it part. Coolant and clutches do not mix well, coolant will make them slip. Oil reduces the heat transfer in the radiator and the entire engine. Flush several times, both the trans and radiator until there is no trace. Hope you caught it in time.

When the engine is running you're probably getting trans fluid in the radiator since that circuit runs around 30psi and the radiator only 5-8psi. Once you shut the engine off and the trans circuit is dead 0psi, the still pressurized cooling system is pushing coolant into the trans.

 

here's the latest... A friend that owns a trans shop was pushing towards replacing the trans with a used one. He indicated that when water gets onto the clutches, the adhesive is no longer good and the clutches separate. I wasn't sure if this sounded right. I'd have thought that as long as the clutch surfaces have/had or are covered with oil, that would keep the water away. At any rate, will be doing most of the flush work and repair myself as the friend wanted lots of money to do a simple flush.

 

just play the ing game. and hoping for the best, and just milk out the life of the tranny as much as you can, i got 27k miles since the first time mine puked itself (but then again i was not in 5th gear too much , which ultimately lead to itself puking twice)





also on some things, used can almost be as bad as it is originally (idk what year you have exactly though, but i know some of the 04 TL's had issues with their transmissions though, so what says you don't get one of those put in....; with used parts you never know it's previous life, and it's maintenance history)



and for the time being, make a transmission fund, and invest it for now, till either the transmission goes, or you sell the car