So I was driving in to work this morning and noticed a bit of smoke coming from under my hood when I was at a stop. I popped open the hood when I got in (noticed smoke about 3 min from work) and isolated the leak.

I found the general location of the leak, but cannot source exactly what could be leaking.. There is a slow drip of coolant from above the engine inside the rats nest, just in front of the manifold and under the black "box" with vaccum hoses going to it..

What do you guys think this could be?

I will be taking off my strut bar after work today in an attempt to get in there and locate the exact source of the leak. Just figured some of you older and wiser owners might be able to give me a good heads up.

I will post pictures this afternoon.

Thanks,

Levi

 

Hi Levi!

Check the hoses going to the turbo beneath the airpump. Good luck!!

 

also, check behind the alternator where where there is a coolant hose connect fromt top of water pump housing going back to block (right abouve your ecu water sensor and thermoswitch). It's in the area of your leak..and could be whisped over to the rats nest/UIM area.

Here is the pic of the location when i was removing all my coolant hoses for replacement. That hose is generally hard so you may have to replace it (grip-n-twist or splice it).

 

Thanks FDZero !! I've too have a small leak somewhere but i just can't find were. I didn't know about this place. I'll check right away myself too.

 

The only coolant hoses on the top of the engine are.
1. Coming from the back of the block to the back of the throttle body.
2. From the underside of the TB to the back of the filler neck, which FDzero has shown.

 

Awesome, thanks for the heads up guys =)

I will report back after I get in there later this afternoon.

 

Ok, as promised I have some pics.


I isolated the location of the leak this morning. It was coming from underneath the black box shown in the picture with the two vacuum hoses coming out of it (not sure what it's called).


Once the sway bar was out of the way I was able to move that black box, exposing my leaky coolant hose.



Just because I could see the leak didn't mean I could get to it.. I had to take out the plastic bit connecting the lower portion of my IC piping to the turbo's.





With that done I only had the bracket in the way, simple to remove...



And there is the culprit, easy access for a simple fix.



Luckily I was at a hobby shop that had a couple of abandoned vehicles which were about to go get crushed.. I went out and found one with good hosing in it and cut off a bit from the overflow tank.



After that it was simply a matter of cutting the correct length to make sure the hose didn't form a kink. I also needed to spray down the upper nipple with some silicone spray/WD-40 in order to get the new hose to fit properly. I blocked the opening and cleaned off the tip just to be sure that no WD-40 got into the coolant system.

I had a bit of difficulty putting some bits back together (the screw on the manifold side of the IC piping would not go in properly. I discovered that this was due largely in part to the bolt being utter ****. I had to abandon getting it in properly since the shop was about to close down.

Also, I didn't realize until I was getting on the highway and tried to jump up to speed that I had absolutely NO BOOST PRESSURE after my little fix. I stopped off at the next gas station and franticly checked all the vacuum hoses (none of which I had tampered with) to see what happened. Nothing, though there was a very noticeable sucking sound coming from the engine when there should have been the whine of turbo's.

I finally figured out what the problem was when I got home and had the light of my garage to check again. When I was taking off and replacing the IC piping I some how managed to pull the clamp attaching the piping to the lower inlet off.. maybe I loosened it to get the upper piping apart easier and just dont remember it... anyway. Replaced the pipe and clamp and took the 7 back out for a test.

Perfect!

So yeah. Thanks a bunch for the suggestions guys =) success only cost me $6.00 to use the hobby shop for about two hours (with a good bit of ******* around).

Cheers,

Levi

 

So after you inspected the old coolant hose, was it hard and cracked? Was that the hose causing the leak?

 

Sorry, yes.

The small hose on the right in the last picture was the cause of the leak. It wasn't old and cracked like an original hose would be though. I can only assume all the coolant hoses were replaced when the engine was rebuild (about 15k ago), though this is the second hose to go for me.. It was actually in quite good condition aside from a small incision (about 1cm at the surface) which leaked out a small, but steady flow of coolant when the engine was hot and had been operating for a little while.