Possible Heater Hose???

[ceedy_18]

Hey Guys,

Got me a 95 BT1 5ltr. Nice ride all in all. She's had a pretty tough life. Recently she's been losing a fair bit of coolant and I have noticed it leaking down onto the exhaust from above the starter motor. I keep an eye on the temp gauge on the dash, but she never gets too hot. Does anyone know if this is the heater hose? From the engine bay, everything is clean, no leaks, but underneath and the puddles tell a very different story.

Can anyone give me detailed info to fix her? I'm still learning as I go.

Cheers..

[hako]

Sounds more like one of your welch or expansion plugs are leaking - I'd degrease under the engine and then try and track down exactly where it is leaking from - get under (safely) and use a torch preferably after dark as you may see the water glisten.
Also check under the waterpump - again with a torch. Maybe also use a mirror to look around and underneath. If it is a leaking welch plug then they all probably need replacing but hopefully it's the waterpump or a hose leaking (much cheaper to fix!).
Hope this help you and welcome to the forum.

[ceedy_18]

Thanks Hako, you wouldn't be the first to suggest that to me today. One of the guys at work has a HZ ute that he retro'd in a 5ltr.

Well I've got use of a pit on Saturday, so I'll be "Safely" under her, lets just hope i can see far enough up the firewall to potentially see the leak.

Anyone got a rough idea if it were the welsh plugs what it's going to cost? I'm in Perth.. but word of mouth always goes a long way.

[88GreenVN]

Is there some heater hoses that run under the top engine covers - if so (like the VN) there is a joiner in the hose set and could be leaking too. Worth a check maybe.

[undar8ed1]

I`d replace all the hoses and heater tap whilst doing a full flush (plenty of info on here with a quick search) as a fellow BT1 owner it is well worth getting it done as the joiner GREEN mentioned can get frail and leak, when I bought mine it had f**king moss growing on the joint, OMG I thought ...who
lets it get that bad. as I say best thing I ever done and it gives me peace of mind when on a long trip.

[ceedy_18]

Yeah I have kept an eye on said joiner.. I had to tighten it about 6 months ago.. but has only just started leaking the odd drop here and there. Other than that, that's the only mess I can see from the top of the engine bay... I'm fearing it could be something bigger as when I top the radiator up it usually takes 2 or so litres and the puddle left underneath is about 20cm in diameter.. YIKES!!

[vsv8berlinawag]

Could also be the inlet manifold gasket. When the 5 litres are at this age they usually go either at the front or back of the engine. With a bit of patience you can do do it yourself in a day. Check the heater valve as the plastic end could be brittle as mine snapped off when I was tightening the clamp (I bought mine from REPCO's for $40 last Easter Sunday (lucky there !!!)). Also the joiner on the other side started to leak as well, so I cut about 1/2 " off the ends where they go on the joiner and reclamped them and all is good now.

[ceedy_18]

Well I had use of a pit on saturday. Got under it and had a look around.
I traced a dribble of coolant from what looks to be the last inch of the passenger head where it joins the block. Well I think it's the head. Was pretty hard to see actually.

Question is, how hard is it to do myself??

[hako]

Chemiweld sounds good to me.

[vsv8berlinawag]

Well I had use of a pit on saturday. Got under it and had a look around.
I traced a dribble of coolant from what looks to be the last inch of the passenger head where it joins the block. Well I think it's the head. Was pretty hard to see actually.

Question is, how hard is it to do myself??

Well it's something like this....
Take your covers off i.e. fuel rail and throttle body covers and then grab the old digital camera and take some snaps of where the vacuum and heater hoses go. Next label the hoses with masking tape and a texta. Grab a bucket and jack up the car on the passenger side and take off the front air dam and then take off the bottom rad hose and depending how old the coolant is keep it in the bucket or ditch (environmentally of course!). Remove the accelerator cable and throttle body, vacuum and heater hoses and electrical connectors, fuel rail and injectors. Grab a 14mm socket (I think) and working from the centre and then going diagonally out from the centre, remove the 14 bolts holding the inlet manifold down and then get some old rags and stuff all of the nooks and crannies between the heads and the cam at the bottom so that no crap gets inside the oil and water galleries. Clean the old gasket crap off the sides of the heads and the mating surface of the inlet manifold and then replace with new (around $20 from GM). Don't forget to buy the plastic locating pins for the gaskets (about $1 each - you need 4) and the tube of high temp Silastic for the manifold seals x 2 (around $10 all up) that sit front and back of the engine. Once the seals and gaskets are located and the Silastic "blobbed" on each end of the manifold seals, put it all back together! The manifold bolts will need to be torque down (approx 40Nm) as well in a specific sequence. You can also spend $50 and buy a Max Ellery's manual for the details that I missed.

A couple of pics...




Good luck and save some $$$'s or pay the man !

PS - Take out another day and polish the bananas while the manifold is out like I did ????

[ceedy_18]

That doesn't look overly had to do.. if it's a head gasket??? How much harder is it? Suppose looking at the above photos, i'd need to do the inlet manifold gasket and heads together anyway.
Anyone got pics and info on head gasket removal and replacement. My biggest worry is the rockers and junk on top of the heads.