Radiator / Coolant Leaks

albertj wrote:

I had a '69 Rambler that overheated, water pump did not weep or seem bad - but it turned out that when the car got up to temp the impeller (which was stamped steel) expanded enough that it'd let go of the axle.

Albertj

how the hell do you figure that out?

Rick - thanks for the info. I'll def keep that in mind

jonly wrote:

albertj wrote:

I had a '69 Rambler that overheated, water pump did not weep or seem bad - but it turned out that when the car got up to temp the impeller (which was stamped steel) expanded enough that it'd let go of the axle.

Albertj

how the hell do you figure that out?

A dad that had great car sense was the key for me. Here's what we saw--it would overheat while sitting but not moving and there was apparently nothing wrong. When moving it ran warmer than usual. Further:

- no leak in radiator, known good & not clogged (it was a recent brass recore of the original)
- no telltales of head problems: no oil in coolant, no coolant in oil
- no leaks
- fan (driven by thermal clutch) working fine

With that pattern, first thing to do (said Dad) is replace water pump (at least on the '69 Rambler with no A/C, there's no other explanation). A doctor would call it "diagnosis by exclusion." I would call it "lacking better alternative or any counterargument, be quiet and do what you are told."

With water pump off, Dad pours boiling water on impeller and flicked it off shaft with screwdriver. Then says, not in so many words, that it's supposed to stay on the shaft at boiling water temperature because that's why the impeller is there in the first place--to move hot water.

So that's how the h-ll you figure it out. Hang around the motor pool or work with someone who did (dad was an Army Reserve quartermaster, motor pool is one of the things those guys care about).

Albertj

PS: if you can avoid it, don't buy dirt-rip cheapie water pumps with stamped impellers

I love the mechanic/yoda stories. here's an off topic one that I love sharing.

Had a '92 Olds Delta 88 that would not keep a charge. I'd learned to just leave the charger on it after replacing battery and alternator. I told my grandfather who was in his final chair sucking on oxygen at the time.

He pulls the oxygen mask off and says "Take out the trunk light, bud."

Problem solved.

LOL, cough, cough, cough!!!!!!

Gotta give up the smokes, that was excellent.

Well, I got the car to Oregon... barely!!!

the fuel pump clogged up right outside of Pittsburgh... had to get a POS one from Advance on the way and install it in the parking lot. Of course the damn thing was defective (sending unit was jammed and the pump whine was unbelievable) so Im sending it back. After I got to Oregon I cleaned the old Bosch one that was in there and cleaned the tank and all seems to be working OK for now.

The car started missing really bad in Wyoming then just died on I-80... A really great place for a car to die... 50 MPH winds and FREEZING COLD. Fuel Pump would not come on. let it sit and fiddled with some fuses and it started right up... weird.

started to miss again in Idaho so I gave it some WOT a few times and it got much worse. Pulled over and changed the fuel filter but it didn't help. limped the car along (I was following our moving truck so the car was just cruising most of the trip) until 135 miles from Bend, Oregon it started to run really bad... A hard steady miss. Had to pack the car up on the car hauler and drive my trusty Isuzu Rodeo the rest of the way. So much for my triumphant return to Oregon LOL.

Fiddled with the car in the garage yesterday and Ill be if it wasnt the rear coil pack was bad. I pulled the plug wire off of #6 and the car didn't run any worse, I pulled the wire off of the front coil and KERPOWWW!!!! I got a nice jolt and sparks were going all over the coil pack! holy crap!!!! that'll wake you up in the morning!. Ran down to Auto Zone and got one of their $25.00 coils and the car purrs real nice now.

I was just admiring how good the car was running when I noticed steam coming from under the hood.... now the radiator driver's side tank is cracked!!!! Man, I cant get a break with my Riv lately. Car hasn't given me hardly any trouble until a couple of months ago. So I'm gonna throw in an Auto Zone POS radiator... Yeah.... I'm really looking forward to the tranny cooling lines.

Im going to be changing my plugs to 104's. the advance guy in Pittsburgh sold me AC-Delco 40-604's or something. I'm thinking they are too hot and causing some knock. I bought them before I found this board so I didn't know any better. the car is still kind of hesitating under hard (not WOT) acceleration so Im thinking the plugs need to be changed.

Other than the nail-biting, OMFG-My-Car_Isn't-Going-To-Make-It paranoia that I had the Riv was an extremely comfortable car to drive across the US. I spent 18 hour days driving and had no discomfort at all (those seats are amazing). My cat rode in the car too and he liked burrowing down behind the driver's seat and slept almost the entire trip except here ....

I flushed out mine as soon as I got it, that stuff is bad news, mine had 50k on it.

Nothin to do. Punched out early to tinker with my car. Lifted it up to clean up the weld job on the exhaust from the recent header install. Found some fluid coming from a push pin that holds the front air dam on. Took it apart to inspect. YAY! My Radiator is leaking! Looks like fun.....

Abaddon wrote:

Nothin to do. Punched out early to tinker with my car. Lifted it up to clean up the weld job on the exhaust from the recent header install. Found some fluid coming from a push pin that holds the front air dam on. Took it apart to inspect. YAY! My Radiator is leaking! Looks like fun.....

Actually for you it won't be that bad. GM was nice enough and used pretty common parts in the cooling system. A couple trim-to-fit Goodyear hoses, a Modine radiator (or your other choice whatever) and while you are at it might want to replace the heater hoses & thermostat (unless you have a top-shelf one in there already) and you are all set.

Yeah, stat and upper hose are new. I'm sure I'll end up replacing everything anyway.....it's always "well, while I'm in here..."

Sounds like fun Scott, isn't it always the way, you always come across something wrong when tinkering. Have fun man, shouldn't be a big job for you.

Do we need a write up or "how to" on Radiator replacement? I could do it on a slow day at work, good pics......

a write up would be cool. it took about an hour to replace mine.

Abaddon wrote:

Yeah, stat and upper hose are new. I'm sure I'll end up replacing everything anyway.....it's always "well, while I'm in here..."

Words to live by!

Abaddon wrote:

Do we need a write up or "how to" on Radiator replacement? I could do it on a slow day at work, good pics......

Another axiom: We can never have enough writeups...

mmmk. Write-up it is I spose.

Went to the gas station this morning, left the car running. Looked out at it while standing at the cashier. The leak has already gone from a lil dribble to a steady piss. WTF! Thought I'd get at least a week out of it.....

They are pretty easy to replace I took mine out when it was leaking and the hold down block for the condenser had a crack down the side of it and was leaking and took some alcohol and cleaned the area really good and then took a soldering iron to the crack and melted the crack in to a v shape and then took my glue gun and filled the seam that I made with the glue gun and let it cool over night and put it back in the next day and have been running it ever since.

Eh, nice new shiny one is here. $120 WooHoo! Need to find time.

Have to fix the oil leak on my boss' '79 T.A. 6.6L, which is for sale BTW.
He had a body man rebuild the engine (before I started here). It's puking oil. Already fixed the trans leak......

cool you will be in business now.

Yeah, in business alright. Took pics and such for a write-up. Get it all together to find that the trans cooler lines are BOTH leaking. Apparently they didn't feel the need to put thread sealer on the adapters they installed. This is AFTER it's back together. So I tighten 'em down (we were closing) just enough to get home and back to work, where I would remove the adapters and add thread tape. On the way home, my battery light comes on. I pull into a neighborhood and pop the hood. The Alternator stud pulled right out of the Alternator! I was lucky enough to make it to my uncles house, where at least I know the car is safe. Bad part is, NOBODY stocks the damn thing, all SPO. So now I have to catch a ride with the woman in the morning. She leaves an hour before I do. It's gonna be a lonely wait before anyone else shows up in the morning......

Man, I'm glad it's not getting you down and we aren't seeing a new for sale ad for your car. you've had your share of frustrations lately. For some not so cheap parts.

The places you do business with, when they say SPO, is it usually the next day.?

With my local NAPA they offer an 150 amp Re-Man with a 2 year warranty for the same price as the other places with a stock output and 1 year warranty.

I know with the 2 places I do most of my business with, they don't have the Riv specific stuff in stock but can always have it the next morning or afternoon.
But parts for a regular GM 3800, everyone seems to have them in stock.

Yeah, regular 3800 parts are a dime-a-dozen. The place we deal with has it stocked in their warehouse, takes a day to get. The Alternator is about $130 with tax (my price).

As far as the For Sale sign.....lol. NEVER! It's 12 years old, I love it, and shit happens. It's just ironic that the timing these parts have for Fa!Ling. It seems every time I fix one thing, something completely unrelated goes.....pretty soon, the whole damn thing will be new, and then the process starts over lol.

[quote="Abaddon"]Yeah, regular 3800 parts are a dime-a-dozen. The place we deal with has it stocked in their warehouse, takes a day to get. The Alternator is about $130 with tax (my price). /quote]
That's a very good price with tax.
The last time I checked with NAPA on the High Output 150 amp and 2 year warranty it was about $180.00 IIRC.
But I could have got the normal High Output 140 amp with either a 6 mo or 1 yr warranty for about 130 as well.
I just figured I'd get the higher output and longer warranty for not that much more money.
As it turned out, I didn't need the whole alternator and replaced the diode bridge for very little money along with the brushes.

Abaddon wrote:

Yeah, in business alright. Took pics and such for a write-up. Get it all together to find that the trans cooler lines are BOTH leaking. Apparently they didn't feel the need to put thread sealer on the adapters they installed. This is AFTER it's back together. So I tighten 'em down (we were closing) just enough to get home and back to work, where I would remove the adapters and add thread tape.

Man, that sounds like dejavou. Thats exactly what happened to me, but in my case I thought I didn't have the trans line sitting properly in the seat of the adapter, but a little pipe thread compound solved the problem. That sucks about the Alternator!

Rickw wrote:

The last time I checked with NAPA on the High Output 150 amp and 2 year warranty it was about $180.00 IIRC.
As it turned out, I didn't need the whole alternator and replaced the diode bridge for very little money along with the brushes.

I'd love to replace the bridge. But the damn stud pulls right out, plastic and all. It appears that there was a nut holding the other end....who knows where that ended up. Thx for the 150A NAPA heads up. I'll have our writer call 'em tomorrow.

BMD wrote:

but in my case I thought I didn't have the trans line sitting properly in the seat of the adapter, but a little pipe thread compound solved the problem

Actually, it is exactly the same! In a frenzy (cause the doors were closing), I took off the top brace for access. Put thread tape on the fittings and put it all back together.....still puking fluid. Just grabbed my 19mm open end and tightened up the couplers. Thankfully, the header was nice and hot already! Got it down to a slow dribble to fix tomorrow. Half way home is when that nice pretty bright red light came on.....

Cars... Can't live with 'em, can't shoot 'em full of holes and still get to work the next day.