Cooling system problem
 

Ok first off I did a search and couldnt really find anything exactley like my situation...And thanks in advance for any help!
I have a 93 with a front mount IC and stock radiator. My problem is any time I drive the car for any good amount of time and then park it it spews coolant out of the over flow tank (which I have change the stock one out for an alumin can). This sunday I autocross raced her and it got very hot (130c) and spewed all the coolant out...I let her cool down and refilled the system...ran her again with no problems...after the awards I drove her home (about 30 miles) the temps were fine but about 5miles from my house I started to get water on my windshield, so the system was overflowing from the catch can and blowing up on to my windsheild. The temps were around 93c until I pulled into the driveway and it shot up to 110c...so I knew it was becuse of the lack of fluid in the system so I shut her down...I belive the whole temp problem is due to the fact that the system is overflowing...but why is the system over flowing??? I have moved the stupid air seperator tank becuse of the fmic and suspect that may be a factor. And this is a speractic problem happens some times and some times its fine.

coolant seals might be going...but check your t-stat and you radiator cap it might be worn out already..

rad cap is brand new (greddy cap)....and is there any other symptoms I should be looking for to point too bad coolant seals?

check your electric cooling fans i had the same problem :bigthumb:

fans work fine...have them wired so both are on the all the time. car runs cool...when theres coolant in the car ;)

dude. have the cooling system pressure tested. this sounds like a classic example of bad coolant o rings or you may be lucky and only have a bad hose somewhere. if they can't find the leak then have them do a chemical test over the overflow (i.e. coolant reservoir tank).

if it's the coolant o rings it may seem sporadic due to you're cooling system gushing all of the coolant out of the over flow and onto the floor, then sucking it back up when it cools down (there by leaving the coolant reservoir low or empty). You will most likely top off the filler neck after you observe this. However, when you run the car the combustion gasses will overtake the displacement in the cooling system and start the whole process of coolant overflowing through your reservoir. But this is where it may seem sporadic. Since your reservoir is low or empty it'll have room for the extra coolant that's gushing out, but once it's full it'll be on the floor thereby, making it look like the incident is sporadic.

btw this is from personal experience. your problem may differ, but in anycase i hope your problem is a simple and you get it fixed soon.

crap....sounds like thats it....so what do I do to replace the coolant O rings...but my car has done this for allmost a yr now...

If the o-rings are the problem, that is an engine rebuild.

Pressure test the cooling system as well as have it tested for hydrocarbons. This will let you know if the coolant seals are the problem or not.

how do you do a test for hydrocarbons? And worse case, how long can I get away with seals being bad...do I run a risk of hurting anything else if I keep driving on it?

You take it to a shop.

You could warp the housings causing your rebuild cost to go up exponentially (as housing are not cheap).

Get the car checked out by a professional, then you'll have an idea on what you need to do next.

make sure no coolant lines are pinched. ie ast to reserve, that happened to me and it overflowed..

brandon

Check the AST cap... mine has gone out 3 times in two years. The last time I overheated b/c of it.