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Brown liquid under coolant cap, along with sludge build up

altonarona

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I was recently checking on my v6 ecotec and noticed under the radiator cap that brown liquid was there, along with some sludge building up. See attached images.

My mind immediately thinks either head gasket, valley gasket, or something wrong with the transmission cooling.

The weird thing is that there is no real symptoms coming from the car. Oil looks clean with no sludge or foam under cap or dipstick, car runs great, doesn't have overheating issues. Only thing that I could think thats related is that the coolant level is a touch low.

It has only appeared in the last 500kms or so. For context my car has done about 285k kms.

I was just wondering if anyone else has had a similar issue or knows exactly what is the probable cause.

Cheers
 

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tml678

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deleted - the info I quoted related to oil cap sludge rather than radiator cap sludge as per the OP’s issue
 
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altonarona

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deleted - the info I quoted related to oil cap sludge rather than radiator cap sludge as per the OP’s issue
This is under the radiator cap not the oil cap. The oil cap looks normal.
 

J_D 2.0

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I was recently checking on my v6 ecotec and noticed under the radiator cap that brown liquid was there, along with some sludge building up. See attached images.

My mind immediately thinks either head gasket, valley gasket, or something wrong with the transmission cooling.

The weird thing is that there is no real symptoms coming from the car. Oil looks clean with no sludge or foam under cap or dipstick, car runs great, doesn't have overheating issues. Only thing that I could think thats related is that the coolant level is a touch low.

It has only appeared in the last 500kms or so. For context my car has done about 285k kms.

I was just wondering if anyone else has had a similar issue or knows exactly what is the probable cause.

Cheers
I’m putting my money on the transmission cooler. I definitely looks like oil/transmission fluid and if you’ve eliminated engine oil then it’s probably transmission fluid.
 

tml678

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This is under the radiator cap not the oil cap. The oil cap looks normal.

yeah I realised that after I posted sorry. Original post has been edited
 

turbovich

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OMG. I've been through this. Look up my post on it. I got told it was valley gasket. So I changed it . It wasn't valley gasket. So I was like FFS ! So then got a new radiator. Fixed it. Old one had obviously been leaking. But not obvious at the time.
 

altonarona

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OMG. I've been through this. Look up my post on it. I got told it was valley gasket. So I changed it . It wasn't valley gasket. So I was like FFS ! So then got a new radiator. Fixed it. Old one had obviously been leaking. But not obvious at the time.
Was a radiator swap all it took or did the coolant get into the transmission and do damage?
 

Immortality

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This is a very common problem on the ecotec and is caused by the lower intake manifold gaskets failing.
 

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Agreed, most times LIM gasket is the cause. Rarely it's head gaskets. Looks like motor oil to me, identical to the slop that comes out of my catch can. If you want to be certain, get your radiator pressure tested
 
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