Hi everyone,

I'm having a serious problem with my FD..

every time I stop on a traffic light or when I arrive home and stop, I lose lots of coolant water that comes out through the expansion tank..
the "Add coolant" red light lights up on the dash, and the warning buzzer kicks in too..
one of the times that happened, I had to stop because the temp gauge needle started to rise up from the middle point..
the water was bubbling hard and I heard a loud bubbling sound of the water (and air, I presume) flowing inside the circuit.

I'm planning to replace the waterpump, the termostat and was thinking about eliminating the AST.. but I'm not sure if that will solve the problem since I don't understand why the water comes off through the expansion tank

any advice would be great.

thanks a lot,
Pedro

 

are your fans turning on?

 

yes, when I'm cruising with the car warmed up, then I stop, I lose the water and the fans are on.

but I made a test this afternoon, with the car cold, I filled the circuit and turned the car on.

after 5 minutes of idle, the "add coolant" lighted up along with the buzzer.. temp gauge needle was 'cold' yet.

I went for a little ride around my neighborhood and as soon as I started moving, the buzzer and 'add coolant' light went off.

took 5 minutes around, when I stopped, the car wasn't fully warm yet, the fans were off, but as soon as I stopped, the 'add coolant' and buzzer went on and I lost the water again..

 

I would see about getting your cooling system pressure tested and/or tested for hydrocarbons. When I had the same symptoms many years ago, my coolant seals had failed.

 

I had similar problems when i bought my car and it was my coolant seals also.

 

I guess that's synonym of rebuild

Is there any other possible cause?

How can I do those tests? and what results should I expect? I guess no carbon inside the cooling system would be nice, but I dunno how to test that.
but what about the pressure? is there a good and bad value?

Some one told me I should try to purge the system more carefully.. But I don't know how to do it.. Can someone explain me the steps to purge the cooling system?

thanks again..

 

Este link e informativo:
https://www.rx7club.com/3rd-generation-specific-1993-2002-16/big-fat-fd3s-cooling-thread-571088/

Boa sorte.

 

portuguese? dude wtf?? lol


try bleeding the system but thats kinda like wishfull thinking...when I first bought my FD it shot coolant out of the overflow a few times. The needle didnt move though, and more important it turned out to be caused by a number of things... heatsoak, overfilled system, and stock operating fan temps. I bled it a few times, stoped adding coolant/water and deleted the ast.

since you already clearly overheated it, I would go ahead and do the standard test and verify the coolant seals are still holding!

Mileage and condition of the engine???

 

Other possible causes? Yes. Probable? Probably not. You could check/change your coolant caps. But there's not much to the system. A bad thermostat won't typically cause the low coolant buzzer to sound.

Hydrocarbon tests are common on all cars. Any shop near you which works on cooling systems in cars probably has the equipment to do the test.

Same as the test above. Pressure testing cooling systems is common on all vehicles. Any places that can do a coolant change in your area probably has equipment to pressure test it.

http://www.fd3s.net/cooling_system_flush.html

 

sorry guy, i didnt catch your location....my bad!! Do what mahjik sugests!

 

don't know if you seen my post about it mate, had the same problem, went to get is serviced and this really "smart" mechanic told me that my radiator needs replacing, i have bought new radiator+ hoses, but i havent got tools and place to replace it. so what i did was, just because i was replacing induction kit and pipes, after i taken them out i had access to radiator hose (the top one) i thought, see what happends if i replace it.

and gues what, i replaced the hose added coolant and coolant light didn't coma back on so far, i have tested it, normally when i stopped the car it was throwing coolant out, now it doesn't do that + i didn't loose any cooland since yesterday (i took my mates for a spin - hammered my car, and normally after i stop it would throw the coolant out - it didn't )

worth checking mate, not saying it's definetely it, but give it a shot, juast replace hoises and see what happends

 

Guys thanks a lot for you help,

Mahjik if I have to face a possible rebuild, I'll start by doint those tests, thanks for the tips.

gracer7 thanks for the portuguese words.. it felt nice abraço

2fast7s how can I test the coolant seals? doing those tests Mahjik talked about? thanks

sickboy.. since It's on my plans.. I'll do it before any other extreme stuff thanks

I started the bleeding procedure.. and I'm now waiting the car cools down..
I've already done the main part of the procedure.. I took it for a ride, let it warm up.. and the light and buzzer went on, but when I stopped, it didn't throw any water out.. which is new

I'm optimistic about it.. lol

the car has 71k miles now, it came from japan (wrong driving side here in Portugal) and I guess it wasn't very well treated by it's previous owners.
I'm trying to get it back to shape and when I have something to show you, I'll do it..

thanks again