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"Losing" Coolant?

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Erm, yeah strange one. sometimes my car empties the coolant reservoir in a day, and sometimes it doesnt. Cant determine when and how either.
Its gone through litres and litres, but i cant see any leaks or puddles? only thing i can think of is that when i'm driving and the system is under pressure something has a tiny hole and sprays it on the road..

bit strange though how it only does it sometimes. Anyone got any other suggestions? I've got an uprated 50mm radiator & standard rubber hoses (going to get silicone ones shortly)

Cheers!
 

meddler

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check your turbo lines. If they are cracked and spraying onto the turbo, you will never see it. Do you smell coolant as you are driving?
 
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check your turbo lines. If they are cracked and spraying onto the turbo, you will never see it. Do you smell coolant as you are driving?
nope, cant smell any coolant, i'l pop the heatshield off and check the turbo :)
 
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when your car is cold do you then fill the overflow to the high mark or low mark?
 

drifter

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check your turbo lines. If they are cracked and spraying onto the turbo, you will never see it. Do you smell coolant as you are driving?
Same suggestion from me :) The only other time mine lost loads of water was when it lunched the headgasket :(
 
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I've checked the turbo lines as much as i can from peering down the top (which isnt much) and cant see anything, but the manifold and other bits are in the way. dont really fancy removing the manifold as its the stock one and dont want the old bolts snapping off (like many already have on my car :( )

when my car is cold i fill it just past the high mark because i've got a 50mm radiator. I've never seen the fluid drop below the top of the top fins on the radiator too..
 
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Just a theory but its been done before, by myself and many other people. You may already know this but this is the cheapest and easy option so eliminate it first.

Ive also go a 50mm alloy rad i only fill the overflow to the low mark on cold. my mix is a 50/50 to keep the boiling point higher then the 30/70 mix. Even though the more water in the mix the better the cooling. If you are filling to the high level and are mixing at 30/70 and after going for a burn keep finding that your level is low, look around the bottom of the overflow tank and see if its heating up and expanding so is just dripping it out the breather hole on the top of the overflow tank and running down the side, sometimes you cant see this unless you remove the tank as most people drive very easy after a good thrashing which would in turn cool the fluid down causing it to contract and suck back into the system, leaving your overflow empty and the level in your rad lower then before you started. mine expanded and ran down the back of the overflow and just dripped out the place where the intercooler pipe goes, and at the time i had no plastic guard so it just dripped onto the ground never to be seen again.

the overflow/expansion tank is exactly that, not a reservoir for extra coolent. The more water in the mix the more its going to expand or the lower the boiling point, so the larger the capacity needed to cope with the expansion, which is why the tank has a cold and a hot level marking on it.

by the way you can see the water feed and oil feed line bolts from underneath, engine side, after the plastic guard has been removed. If you remove the manifold heat shield you can see the water return bolt on the turbo, and using a pen style mirror you can see the water and oil feed on the turbo, looking down and underneath.

Hope that may be of some help,,,, maybe
 

craig8585

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I'd say it's because you have the bigger rad which holds a lot more water than the original. This means when the waters hot, theres a lot more of it to expand, thus it'll fill and overflow from the expansion tank. When the water cools, it will appear that your expansion tank is empty.

I've given up topping mine up now. Just take the rad cap off every few weeks to make sure the rad is still full. Only real solution would be a custom made and larger expansion tank :)
 
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s15dave

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i had leaking coolant that i coudlnt find...turned out to be a pin hole in a turbo line, evaporating instantly as it hit hte turbo. car smelt like coolant

i found it by going to a mechaninic and pressurising the cooling system. he had this radiator cap that he screwed onto the radiator, and could attach his compressed air line to......

within a few seconds i had water pouring out of the line and could find the leak easily.
 
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maybe a 1.1 bar rad cap? to help raise the boiling point, or if you have lots of confidence in the rest your water seals a 1.3bar cap. I have a 1.1 and ive changed the turbo lines to braided. the expansion tank level hardy changes after a bit of a blast the other day the level rose about half a inch.
 
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Cheers for the advice spoonman & craig! What you're saying makes sense! i'l try topping it up more concentrated next time and see what happens. I've also thought of an idea based on that... If you stick a sheet of paper underneath the expansion tank, then if it overflows it'l stain the paper and leave a mark of some kind for sure! and hey presto, you'l know if the water is coming out of there or not! Just gotta make sure its fastened down enough and doesnt catch fire haha..

I think my rad cap is rated to 1.3 bar...... but not 100% as the sticker has come off. its the one that comes standard with the 50mm japspeed rad.

I like the idea of a pressure test too, i reckon that could be done with a foot pump and a slice of silicone or something to form a seal round the rad cap... hmm.
 
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!! SOLVED !!

The coolant was sloshing out the top of the expansion tank.

Simple test -
1. Get some thick paper, drew a pattern all over it with a highlighter and wrapped it around the top of the expansion tank (with a gap to breathe) and fasten securely
2. Drive hard
3. Once you've finished driving, pull the paper out and you should have smudged ink and stained paper!

Simple problem finding!
Now to stop it overflowing lol.
 
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cooling basics

1: Fill to low mark ONLY when cold
2: mixture at 50/50 (any stronger concentrate mix and the coolent will not be very good and transferring heat off)
3: Oil cooler to keep engine temp more stable in the first place
4: Make it possible to air to be ducted onto the rad from the outside not just threw the FMIC
5: Ease up on the duration of full jandle time
 
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