On a recent drive noticed a small leakage of coolant from the white plastic reservoir tank on the drivers side of the engine bay at the front as the car was sitting there (engine off) and cooling down. It was a small leak from somewhere under the tank. Checked the all over the rest of the engine, AST, etc and no leaks. Water temps were holding at 83-85 (indicated on PFC)
Then tonight I drove the car for about 15 miles at motorway speeds, not pushing hard and staying off secondary turbo, no problems, still holding 83-85 but as I went to finally pull into the driveway, the coolant buzzer went off. Switched engine straight off but couldnt notice any coolant leak. What is going on???
No excessive white smoke on start up, fairly easy to start, high 7s compression figures all round and drives great. The car has been sat for about 6 months not doing much but cant think of anything else. I want to drive it to hayward rotary to get it checked but am crapping myself at it blowing up on the motorway as I am a solid hour away. What could be the problem? Are the seals gone? The guy I bought it from said it could be a crack in the coolant reservoir.
Just saw this thread, could it be this? Im praying its air in the system or something similar but not enough knolwedge to make a proper guess.
http://www.mazdarotaryclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=65616&highlight=coolant
Can be a number of things, airlocks in the system, a faulty pressure cap on the AST tank... but yes, worst case scenario is a blown water seal or cracked engine plate which allows combustion pressure to force gas into the coolant, coolant overflows into the tank in the wing but doesn\'t return as it\'s meant to. As you top the water up, it fills the overflow reservoir and eventually that overflows too - leading to the puddle on the floor.
You might not get white smoke as it\'s pushing gases into the cooling system rather than dragging fluid into the combustion chambers.
I hope it\'s not the worst case anyway, best of luck in that respect. You should be ok to drive it to Hayward for a check up, just check the water is full before you set off and don\'t paste it down there.
Thanks for the advice, I think I will try get the car down to Hayward. Before the journey, should I fill up at the tank in the wing or the actual coolant filler pipe (near the airpump)? And what sort of coolant mix should I use?
Sorry for the delay, been in New York with no internet access.
Fill up at the neck near the airpump. I just topped mine up with plain water as wasn\'t losing much, but if you\'ve dropped a lot then mix up some 50:50 and fill it with that.
Take some with you in a bottle too, just in case. :)
Vishal, also have a good look over the rad. One of the cars i recently imported seemed to dump the water when i stopped, i played hell with the supplier who had promised the engine was good. I then thought it may have been the caps or an air lock so kept on using it on short journeys after replacing these items. On the last journey i jacked up the front as soon as i stopped and was extremely pleased to see there was a leak on the drivers side of the rad, i thought all the water was being pushed out of the plastic overflow indicating a probable seal failiure. Also have a good look over the AST tank as this would also cause the problem, another much cheaper fix. Fingers crossed for you matey!!
Dave.
Cheers rxdave, thats slightly reassuring and will check for rad leakage. Seems to be a lot of air in the system that im slowly trying to burp out.
Vish give us a buzz later