okay so i bought the rx-7 today and everything in the engine was perfectly fine. what i didnt care to notice was a keg of coolant sitting in the trunk. about 2 hours ago i started up my car at my friend's house and the coolant buzzer started going off. thats when i realized what that keg was for. i immediately pulled over and checked the coolant reservoir at the front of the car, it was empty. i filled it half-way and waited a few minutes, started up the car and kept driving. the buzzer came back on along with the refuel light (i was on empty) so i rushed to a gas station hoping the fuel level might have something to do with the coolant buzzer. filled it up and the buzzing only came back when i made tight turns and it'd go away after i left each turn.

i pulled over at another friend's house and we let the car sit for 15+ min. there was no coolant on the pavement but when we checked the radiator cap, there was enough room for about...half a quart of coolant, which i poured in. after topping it off, the green coolant quickly became brownish so i figured i'd have to flush the coolant system along with getting a full tune up.

the whole "coolant keg in the trunk" + "no coolant in reservoir+radiator cap" thing freaks me out. will a full tune up fix any of this? can it be an electrical problem? how much will a full tune up for a 7 cost? what the heck, why's my coolant so loww?? i'll check in the morning to see if i have any coolant left. if not, then i'm going to start using distilled water instead.

speaking of which, can using distilled water instead of coolant/antifreeze harm the radiator? i live in socal btw, so antifreeze isn't really necessary.

 

Anti-freeze also helps with cooling....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifreeze_(coolant)

 

Firstly, it helps if you know what car you own. I'm guessing it's not the CRX in your profile...

Secondly, the coolant warning goes off when the radiator is low, not the overflow reservior. Adding water there won't do squat if the radiator is low.

Fill up right up and run it with the cap off to bleed the air out (filler cap on S4, radiator cap on S5). Put the cap on, fill up the overflow reservior and take it for a drive to get it up to temp. Stay close to home in case something happens. If the buzzer doesn't sound and it doesn't overheat you're okay. If it does, let us know.

 

ok turns out there was a leaking hose. phewww. costs 86 bucks to replace?! geebus

 

Mazdatrix has all the FC's coolant hoses and the most expensive one is $31. Who's trying to rip you off?

http://www.mazdatrix.com/bhose2.htm

 

well they said the hose would be special ordered off of mazda and it'd be 30 something. i added a quart of coolant which was 10 and service was like 40. it's a hose on the driver side thats pretty far down and when he pointed it out, it was in fact leaking water. i dont know what it's called though. all i know is that it had a lot of curves to the tube. i'm guessing it's the 31 dollar one and they just tacked on shipping or something.

 

It's the one that always fails, because it is located under the oil filter. The slopped over oil degrades the rubber to the point that it fails.
Should have replaced it yourself and saved the money. And flushed the system at the same time.

 

but how would i replace a hose that's burried so deep? i tried reaching it with my hands from the top of the engine bay, no dice.

 

That's a common one to fail. Funnily enough it is the $31 one...

http://www.mazdatrix.com/getprice.as...m=61-2110-FB03

 

Thats when you might have to remove some stuff to get to it which I dont see why you have to. You gotta do all the work on your rx-7 or else its gonna be pricey. well, i was thinking you had blown coolant seals, but lucky for you it was just a hose.

 

i had to do this on the side of the road during a meet! (thanks again masin and nieto!) only thing we took off were the spark plug wires.

 

Hey buddy i would get used to working on cars because with owning an Rx7's theres a hell of a few mechanics out there that know anything about rotaries. If you dont think your capable of working on cars i would seriously consider getting rid of your Rx7 because its very likely that sometime down the road someone is going to **** up your car. I tell you from personal experience.
Educate yourself on how to work on these cars. Its all right here in this forum, we can help you out. Also look for the fatory service manual which helps a **** load for everything.

 

Gotta love WikiPedia...Distributed ignorance is such a wonderful thing.

"Antifreeze" does NOT HELP with cooling. In fact ethylene glycol is actually a much poorer conductor of heat then water. The reason it is added to water to make our "coolant" mixture is to prevent the water from freezing in cold temperatures and lubricate things like the water pump. It is the cooling systems's pressure that raises the boiling point of water so that it can be used as an effective coolant.

 

I have heard that water is bad for the water pump on rx7s

 

Becuase it does not lubricate properly and causes to seise and corrode.

 

Water is bad for any water pump due to it's lack of lubrication and corrosion resistance. Also it freezes in the cold which can do nasty things like cracking the block.