Alright, I was driving my car home from the exhaust shop (the duals are awesome by the way) when my coolant buzzer came on. I figured I was only a few miles from home, so I drove it there keeping an eye on the temp guage the whole time. When I got home I popped the hood and the coolant was bubbling like crazy, even though the temp guage seemed normal. I thought this was the end of my motor so I went behind the car to look for the telltale smoke/smell. To my surprise - nothing. I had my dad take a look at it (who has smelled his share of burning coolant) and he said it most defenitely wasn't burning.

I've gotta drive this thing to a meet tomorrow, please guys, give me some insight here. I don't think I'm going to bed tonight.

-Darren

 

sounds like an internal problem. my friends rx7 has the same exact problem, bubbling coolant, add coolant light, but no rise in temp and no steam or smell out the exhaust. were gonna crack the block open tomarow to find out exactly what the problem is. my guess is that whatever failed did so in such a way that the compression of the rotors forces gas into the coolant passages, but its not a large enough failure to allow the water pressure to force fluid into the chambers, at least not enough to blow steam. my guess is you can still drive it if you need to but a rebuild is warrated

 

Okay, update: I just went and tried to start it, it wouldn't start. It seems like it might be flooded. There still seems to be a fair amount of coolant in the overflow tank.

 

Hey Darren,

Hope you can make the meet tomorrow. You were at the one in June at the bandshell by the lake in Saint Paul, right?

I have had coolant seals go on second gens. The first time, my beloved Conv, the only way you could tell was the fact that it ate coolant to beat hell. No power loss, no white exhaust clouds. I never did a compression test. I just drove it til I got sick of the GOD AWFUL buzzer. I believe we will have the compression tester at the gathering tomorrow. If you are going to make it, let me know. I also purchased a cooling system pressure tester this summer.

Not that you have the $$, but I have a second gen for sale for 2K.

Keep the faith bro. Don't let it get you down.

Brian

 

I hate to sound bad but i think you indeed have a coolant seal failure. A buddy of mine and i just finished swapping the motor in his vert for the same reason. He was driving home from work not really driving it hard and the same thing happened. The buzzer came on and it was bubbling. He added water and it kept bubbling but the thing about our experience with his car and what your saying that makes it sound the same to me is this. When we shut his car off about an hour later he tried to start it and it was flooded. We did the egi fuse thing, got it to finally start but it was smoking then. Needless to say when coolant started disapearing we knew what occured. So this past couple days we swapped motors out on it. His gave no warning whatsover of it happening. It ran great up until that point. I hope yours isnt this scenerio but it sounds strikingly similar to my buddies car. Good luck with it man, i hope its not this.

 

Yep, I was at the meet last summer.

I will try to make it to the meet, but the car isn't going to leave my house until I know it's not a coolant seal. Keep in mind I have to drive it from North Branch. I'll probably ride with my dad in a different vehicle. I'll pick up a new thermostat and radiator cap while I'm there and pray that one of those is my problem.

This wouldn't suck so bad if I didn't already owe my dad money from the exhaust intsallation costing more than twice as much as it was supposed to.

Here's some more details on the problem:

http://www.teamfc3s.org/forum/showth...703#post487703

 

Update time:

Today I topped off the coolant and started it without the radiator cap. It started on the first crank with no smoke, as usual. After it warmed up I had my dad rev the engine while I stood outside and watched the coolant. When the engine was revved, it sucked the coolant in, just like it's supposed to. Now here's the weird part - when he let off the throttle the coolant level came way up, and when the car was shut off, a little bit overflowed out the top. Is that normal?

-Darren

 

Sounds like a pinhole leak somewhere in the coolant system. If it was a coolant seal you'd have a geyser.

 

try new cap and hoses.

 

Okay, I took it for a drive a few minutes ago. The result: not good.

I didn't take it very far from home just incase. It was fine for a while (including when I redlined it, I was anxious to push it with the new exhaust) until after a while I started to hear sort of a boiling/gurgling noise in the engine bay. Not taking any chances, I pulled over, and checked it out. It stopped when it was idling and when I popped the hood it looked normal. I started driving it home, and the buzzer went off as soon as I turned on the heater sitting at a stop sign. It shut off as soon as I shifted into second . It was kinda intermittant on the couple miles back to my house, but the temp guage never got over 1/2. I parked it and shut it off, and checked under the hood and still nothing. I realized I missed my parkig spot by a few feet so I decided to start it to move it, and check it while it was running. Nothing out of the ordinary, except when I got back in to shut off the car the temp guage was at 3/4.

So, what now?

-Darren

 

Make sure raditor isn't cloged? Are you sure cap is good? No small leaks? Check tb, bac, and heater coolant line. Sounds like like a smal leak somehwere.. then causing water to seep it till the buzzer comes on.