I was on my way to the body shop to have an estimate done on the wheel well rust when all of the sudden the car started smoking on the hightway...the temp was all the way up...luckily the next exit was my cousin's house so I drove it there and parked it...

Did I break her?

 

maybe so....hopefully not....mine overheated and i shut her down.....got it filled back with water and she ran like a top...no severe damage

 

i'm reading up on the forum after smoking a cig and relaxing now...it was white smoke which tells me its the water...

do you think i can fill the radiator again and it be safe to drive to my mechanic tomorrow?

I would LOVE to do the work myself but i just got the car and I don't have all the tools yet to do the work myself...

and I know I didn't by the car like that cuz I drove it 150miles home without a prob...it must have happened when i opened her up on the highway on the way to the body shop...

what's your thoughts?

 

this is what i would do...make sure the belt to your water pump is tight....fill it with water and start it....see ifyou got a leak somewhere....if its not leaking gallons at a time, drive,.....just keep some water with you....and if it gets even a little hot shut it off...its worth a try...

 

will do...thanx! the mechanics is just about 1 mile down the road so i'll take it there in the morn...as for the tools i got a mechanics tool set this weekend...next week i'm getting the 6gal 2hp pancake air compressor and an air tool set from sams...as for books i'm definately getting the haynes rx7 book but was considering getting chiltons book...i should have a working shop by next month to be able to do more for my project car

 

If it overheated that fast it's probably a pretty good sized leak or something, like a heated hose popping off.

 

A 6 gallon tank air compressor is gonna die quick if you use it for anything more than inflating tires. Definately don't try sandblasting with something that small. Hell, we managed to kill a 6 horse, 33 gallon air compressor in under a year...

--Danny

 

Well, I went back today and was filling her up when I found the leak...its the hose coming from the wall to the engine...there are 2, one from the passenger side of the engine to the wall then from the wall to the drivers side of the engine (i think) ... does someone know the name of it so i can order it?...

 

Those are the coolant hoses that go to your heater core... you don't need to order special ones, just visit your local auto parts store with one of the hoses and buy a length of it a few feet long...

--Danny

 

is that a jspec engine or something? ive never seen a black aircleaner... and it says 6 port...im confused!!

 

And it's right hand drive, too.. how 'bout that?

--Danny

 

its a pic i grabed from the pics section of this site...dunno what its from but its the clearest that shows the tube...

can someone tell me the diameter?

 

actually, thinking about it...i'm going to replace all the hoses on the car...any good sites where i can get them all?

 

That's one of your heater hoses. Ask for the one on the left.
That leak shouldn't have caused white smoke out the exhaust unless it had overheated significantly for several minutes causing the water jacket seals to fail, which would require a teardown to fix.
Could the white smoke you saw have been coming from coolant evapourating on the exhaust / catalytic converter rather than out the muffler? Check your spark plugs for coolant in the combustion chamber. If they're dry your coolant seals are ok.

 

I want an aircleaner like that! hah

 

the smoke wasn't coming from the muffler, i think the white smoke came from when the hose busted and all the water hit the exhaust/catalytic, cuz when i pulled over it was still smoking from that spot, i just didn't see hose at that time...i pulled that hose off just a few mins ago to bring to the shop tomorrow...

 

Yeah I knew it was that hose. Make sure when you get the new one put on that it's clamped down tight. Drive it around and watch the temp gauge carefully. The white smoke was probably from coolant burning off of your motor and/or exhaust manifod,etc.

 

Good idea!

www.mazdatrix.com has all the hoses you need.

 

just in case i damaged the car when that happened, what should i check for?

 

The problem with over-heated rotaries is that if any damage was done, it may not necessarily be evident immediately.
What happens is the excessive heat causes the aluminum rotor housings to warp, which in turn causes the water jacket seals to fail.
Yours may not have sustained any damage at all. If the housings were severely overheated the water jacket seals would fail almost immediately and you'd have a huge cloud of white steam coming out of your exhaust so this is not the case here.
But if your housings were mildly warped, the water jacket seals could spring leaks a few weeks or even months down the road. The symptoms would be a) coolant needs to be topped up often, b) whitish sludge on the underside of your oil-filler cap, c) oily deposits in your coolant, d) a white cloud of exhaust that takes longer than usual to dissipate after cold start-ups, e) coolant on spark plugs after the car has sat for a while. Plugs will also have shiny white insulators due to the "steam-cleaning" effect of the coolant entering the combustion chambers, or f) any combination of the above symptoms.
I'd recommend you take the car in to have the cooling system pressure-tested. If that test shows no drop in pressure you've likely dodged a bullet. But keep an eye on things for a few months anyway on the offchance that the seals were damaged but somehow survived the pressure-test.
If you ever have a coolant hose break again, DO NOT try to drive the extra few minutes to a shop or home. Just shut the engine down and either call a tow truck or, if you're close to a shop and broke, wait a couple hours for the engine to cool and then drive it to your destination or until the engine reaches operating temps, whichever occurs first.
Good luck!

Brett.

 

that is alot of good info brett...thanks!!! she's going to the mechanics tomorrow via tow (unrelated prob) so i'll have the pressure checked