Chase the leak!

Danbloke · Post by **Danbloke** » 16 Feb 2005, 13:08

My ZX is having all kinds of difficulties keeping its coolant in. It started last year when the heater matrix went (clouds of steam in the cab water in the footwell etc etc.).
Thanks to this forum I manged to replace that. But I broke the elbow joint that connects to the matrix and it started seeping. Another couple of months and that has been replaced, at which point the radiator started to weep slightly.
A couple of bottles of radiator sealant later I persuaded myself to change the rad. Having just finished that (last weekend) and feeling very pleased with myself, I noticed a pool of water under the car [:0].
This time it seems to be from the back of the engine, is that likely to be the water pump? I can't see where its coming from, but its dripping off of the beam that the steering is attached to.
Has anybody had anything similar happen to them?
Thanks for any help you might be able to give.

wrinklet1 · Post by **wrinklet1** » 16 Feb 2005, 15:15

Hi, I had a water leak at the back of the engine on my Xantia TD. Got it up on the ramps, left it running for a while and found the water hose 'T' that runs from the matrix to the engine and branches off to the expansion tank had split on the joint.Wear rubber gloves and move the tee joint so it leaks if its split. I got a piece of 22mm copper tube and a 22-15-22 brass compression T fitting (15mm branch),make up the fitting with the copper pipe and cut to length, cut the main pipe and fit it to the 22mm pipe onto the main large rubber tubing and fasten with jubilee clips, cut and fit the pipe to the expansion feeder tube fastening again with a jubilee clip. Fill the radiator with water , start the enhine and check for leaks.

Danbloke · Post by **Danbloke** » 16 Feb 2005, 15:38

Thanks for that. I do hope it is the pipes rather than the pump, I can do that myself (and have done before). Only issue now is getting under it, thanks to the Volcane styling its bumper off before I can get it up the ramps [:(!]. That is after I've nicked my brothers ramps!
Is doing the pump possible for a half decent bodger (i.e. me), or is it undo the timing belt and all that gubbins? (I don't fancy that myself)

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » 16 Feb 2005, 19:33

Is it wise to introduce copper pipe into a system with alloy rad, matrix and head?
Water pump is driven from cambelt so...
jeremy

Kowalski · Post by **Kowalski** » 16 Feb 2005, 19:49

Iron blocked engines with aluminium heads used to fill their copper radiators with aluminium, blocking them completely in some cases. I'd say copper wasn't a good thing to introduce.

Danbloke · Post by **Danbloke** » 16 Feb 2005, 20:18

Fingers crossed for the water pump being OK then.
And I'll try and avoid copper pipes just in case.
Thanks for the help!

Danbloke · Post by **Danbloke** » 18 Feb 2005, 13:18

Update!
After struggling with trying to get the bumper off for an hour (and failing miserably), I bit the bullet and took it to the local garage.
A couple of hours later I have a working cooling system! Apparently I must have pulled on of the pipes too much while fitting my new rad and nicked it on an edge somewhere. D'oh!
So it is now working, but I am driving with my fingers crossed for a while yet.
Thanks for the help!

JohnW · Post by **JohnW** » 18 Feb 2005, 14:37

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Danbloke</i>

Fingers crossed for the water pump being OK then.
And I'll try and avoid copper pipes just in case.
Thanks for the help!
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
I'm hyper-careful in this area. However, with proper coolant, changed on spec, I've had copper pipes joining rubber hoses on my Renault R8 (alloy head, iron block, copper radiator, brass tanks) for the best part of 30 years with no hint of trouble.
We already have a hideous mixture of electrolytically active metals, and good quality coolants are designed to retard the corrosion if changed properly.
JohnW