Fluids are disappearing... Help me find where they are going.

hatchet9mm

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Aug 1, 2008
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So I was doing a random walk around and fluid check on my car today. While checking my coolant reservoir it was right below the full line, so it wasn't a big deal in my mind. But then I checked the radiator and found that upper part of the radiator was empty and so was the upper hose, so I did the normal thing and added coolant while squeezing the hose to get the air out. This has happened to me before but it always coincided with some other event like losing coolant while timing the car, or finding a leak at the back of the block. I'm not burning coolant, so where in the hell is it all going, and I never overheat so I am confused. Also oil is slowly going away, but that is probably from blow by. Does anyone have any suggestions?
 

hatchet9mm

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Aug 1, 2008
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Wouldn't the coolant be white or brown or something if the head gasket was blown? Its still a nice neon green.

---------- Post added at 04:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:12 PM ----------

It is still a possibility, I'm going to change the oil early next week and see is there is any coolant in the oil.
 

shipkiller

Member
Sep 16, 2010
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Damnit, stop with the "BHG" everytime someone is loosing coolant. I had a leak in my rad and I was loosing coolant only when the car was running, no puddle under it while parked. Took me a while to find it, it wasn't a BHG.
check your oil. also do a pressure test in your coolant system (if you really have a BHG, you will lose pressure (like any leak will do) but when you start the car, it will be white and smell terribly weird)
 

honeydew

Supra Freebaser
May 10, 2007
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Faulty Rad Cap? Also if the car is completely cold (ie, over night/days coldness) the fluids leak down to the expansion tank (oops VW talk) or overflow tank, you wouldn't necessarily find coolant in top hose or rad. Do you notice gurgling from air when driving? Small crack in thermostat? Enough to drip but still stay functional? Check those two things first; easy and cheap to fix. Althought I am not sure if a crack in the thermostat wouldn't give you one overheat warning or another.

I had a crack in my thermostat housing. It seemed for sure a head gasket while in the driver's seat. Gutless, sudden pin on thermo gauge, no coolant light, and white smoke coming from the hood. Hoses seemed fine and the coolant overflow was perfect. Just a gasket on the thermo housing.

There is a small coolant line coming from the cylinder valley at the firewall and runs along the passenger firewall. Small leak there? Although I wouldn't bet on a hose if the car is functional otherwise, once a slit happens in a hose it chernobyls pretty fast. But that particular hose is/can be wrapped with a heat shield and made a bit stronger for it. People have already mentioned compression test at this point I won't disagree.

Revving high RPMs can get some normal blow by. Any recent honing? Rings seated badly? Maybe blew a ring or two? If the cylinder was off for any reason or just the valve covers, is it possible that the valve cover gaskets were not seated properly? old gasket not scrapped out entirely, That would give you a slow leak you may not notice but is a massive fire hazzard once it seeps to your manifold. Turbo Cooked?

Let us know I always love to hear of new ways these cars ditch coolant.

Do you play with any AFR's? Modded fuel regulator with a hammer? Lexus AFM upgrade?
 

GrimJack

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Dec 31, 1969
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The lines to the overflow tank can cause this as well. They are not pressure lines, so a small crack is easy to miss and generally doesn't get worse fast, like the rest of the system. This includes the line in the overflow for the pickup at the bottom of the tank.

What happens is this - when the system is under pressure, it blows some coolant out into the overflow, which is normal. However, a small leak in the hose means that when it cools down, instead of sucking in coolant from the overflow, it sucks in air from the hole. Do this a couple times and you end up with a system that has a significant amount of air in it where it should have coolant.
 

hatchet9mm

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Aug 1, 2008
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Awesome, you guys are great. The leak that I had before was the one at the back of the head from the heater core (a B&^@# to get to), but if it was the overflow tank shouldn't there be a puddle. As for the oil, a brand new turbo was put on in august, and the engine was bought rebuilt from kneedragger before he moved west, and I just did IMO a great valve cover gasket and 2jz bolt conversion. Its no more than a quarter of a quart every two months. I have been doing a lot more high revving recently, I'm not too worried, if it blows up I'll just go JZ earlier than planned.

---------- Post added at 08:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:24 PM ----------

When I was done filling the coolant today I started it with the cap off and it didn't bubble or change color, the level just raised to almost overfllowing.
 

metaphysico

Mad Scientist
Jan 2, 2008
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A bad cap or hole in the coolant hose to reservoir will usually let the coolant keep going into the reservoir but not going back into the engine making it over full. If its at the normal level but rad is low, I would think the cap is still bad since its not taking in coolant from the res, but I would suspect a leak somewhere. Normally a shop will charge $20 for a coolant pressure test and have it up in the air to find any small leaks. Coolant leaks that are small enough wont leak sometimes but will burn off the hot motor just leaving a white trail.
 

honeydew

Supra Freebaser
May 10, 2007
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Oh! it's a brand new rebuild? Doh! Ya, if it starts burning during break-in it'll usually keep on burning oil for a while. It's probably burning the coolant too as everything settles. It's blow by from the rings seating themselves on a newly honed cylinder wall. Coolant could be squeezing through new, unseated gaskets, too slowly for real concern.

The high revs can lift the head enough to burn up some coolant but not have a BHG issue. Your new head just has not been torqued over the years and the head bolts do stretch a bit during break in. That might also explain the coolant filling up the reservoir. Maybe re-torque head bolts at break-in intervals just to be safe. I get the impression you like to beat the hell outta that thing.

Depending on how aggressive the honer and/or miller was will tell you how long to expect some burn. LOL
 

honeydew

Supra Freebaser
May 10, 2007
164
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Toronto, Ontario
jetjock;1707263 said:
With no leaks and everything working right the cooling system on this car will *always* be completely full.

I think he was talking about a completely cold Supra. Over-the-weekend cold. I know my Supra when cold has coolant to the fill line and little to no coolant when I look under the rad cap.

When Warm-ish like maybe 1/2 day after a drive the coolant level is more like half to low in tank, and yes I see rad fluid in the top of my rad. sorry for that.
 

honeydew

Supra Freebaser
May 10, 2007
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Toronto, Ontario
jetjock;1707274 said:
Then there's something wrong with it. Always means always. That's why I put the * there...

That is very true you are completely right, because I nearly *always* have a coolant issue. POS Supra's. Screw it, burn the thing down and push it over a cliff. Then scream at it: "How's your coolant now, bitch?"

---------- Post added at 04:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:21 PM ----------

HE, thou, is breaking in a new engine, everything is unseated he'll be losing/replacing fluids for a while.

I don't have an excuse for my 7M. It's pretty easy to mess them up fast.
 

metaphysico

Mad Scientist
Jan 2, 2008
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^ hahaah

I didn't read anything about a rebuilt engine, just a rebuilt turbo. But as always jetjock nailed it, coolant should always be full unless there is a problem. And even during engine break in you will not burn coolant, if you are that means coolant is passing the head gasket and if that is the case there is a problem.
 

toytech

Toyota certifed
Feb 10, 2009
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Frankton,Indiana
Why is it so hard to do simple diag yet so easy to guess? Compression test easy, Leak-down test easy, Coolant pressure test easy. Unless your afraid of the truth. Ah just throw some parts at it until your broke then blame the car and sell it.
 

hatchet9mm

New Member
Aug 1, 2008
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Haters gonna hate... LOL

Yesterday I tore down the passenger side of the engine and found that pretty much every single coolant line except the lower Rad hose was dry and hard, possibly even cracked. So I replaced all of those hoses with heater hoses (cut to fit from autozone) instead of what was on the car (3/8 rubber fuel line). I did coolant pressure test and found that the system was holding pressure when cold, that doesn't mean it wasn't losing some when hot. So far I have found no issues while driving as far is coolant is concerned. Upon examining down by the thermostat housing I found that there was puddles of coolant on the P/S bracket which made me look at all of the hoses in the area and then replace them. I do check every thing I can, but because this is my daily and have little time to work on it, I want a good idea of where to look before I start work as to minimize time spent fixing things. I'm not afraid of the truth, but have limited resources and time to discover the truth.

---------- Post added at 02:06 AM ---------- Previous post was at 02:01 AM ----------

the engine is rebuilt, with between 5k and 10k on it now, so I should be out of the break in phase of things. The engine swap was kinda done haphazardly due to a time crunch, so a lot of things may have gone unchecked and or fixed.
 

mkIIIman089

Supramania Contributor
Mar 30, 2005
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jetjock;1707324 said:
Yea, my engine was losing fluids like crazy right off the dealer's lot before eventually stopping. Was even worse just after I rebuild it but then got better. I'm pretty sure they're supposed to do that :)

I lol'd.