Honda Car Forum

Hi,
I have a 98 Honda Accord at about 77k miles. About a month ago when I
changed a light bulb, I realized that the coolant reservoir was empty.
I never paid attention to the bottle before because I assume the guy
who change my engine oil should fill it up. The engine temp is pretty
steady, no overheat at all and I do not see any white smoke from
exhaust. So I fill it up to max. About two week later, the coolant drop
to min line. So I fill it up again. Ever since I start to realize the
coolant level in the bottle decrease slowly since I check it in the
morning when the engine is cold.

So I went to car shop and they did a pressure check and told me the
uppper hose is leaking. So I had them replece both upper hose and lower
hose, flush the coolant. Yesterday morning when the engine is cold, I
fill up the bottle to max. This morning I saw bottle lever went down
again.

Can someone tell me if there are problems here? I appreciate your help.

Thanks a lot

joseph_zhao99@hotmail.com wrote:
> Hi,
> I have a 98 Honda Accord at about 77k miles. About a month ago when I
> changed a light bulb, I realized that the coolant reservoir was empty.
> I never paid attention to the bottle before because I assume the guy
> who change my engine oil should fill it up. The engine temp is pretty
> steady, no overheat at all and I do not see any white smoke from
> exhaust. So I fill it up to max. About two week later, the coolant drop
> to min line. So I fill it up again. Ever since I start to realize the
> coolant level in the bottle decrease slowly since I check it in the
> morning when the engine is cold.
>
> So I went to car shop and they did a pressure check and told me the
> uppper hose is leaking. So I had them replece both upper hose and lower
> hose, flush the coolant. Yesterday morning when the engine is cold, I
> fill up the bottle to max. This morning I saw bottle lever went down
> again.
>
> Can someone tell me if there are problems here? I appreciate your help.
>
> Thanks a lot
>

fill it one more time to be sure. it may just be air expulsion is the
radiator guy did not burp the system properly.

if it's still losing coolant, check the drain plug on the radiator - the
seal may be leaking. if not, check under the car where the water pump
drains through the timing belt cover. if there's coolant there, the
seal's starting to leak. some "weeping" is normal. leaking preceeds
failure.

thanks for the rreply.
I forget to mention, after they repalce the hose, they told me they did
a pressure check again snd do not see any problems.


jim beam wrote:
> joseph_zhao99@hotmail.com wrote:
> > Hi,
> > I have a 98 Honda Accord at about 77k miles. About a month ago when I
> > changed a light bulb, I realized that the coolant reservoir was empty.
> > I never paid attention to the bottle before because I assume the guy
> > who change my engine oil should fill it up. The engine temp is pretty
> > steady, no overheat at all and I do not see any white smoke from
> > exhaust. So I fill it up to max. About two week later, the coolant drop
> > to min line. So I fill it up again. Ever since I start to realize the
> > coolant level in the bottle decrease slowly since I check it in the
> > morning when the engine is cold.
> >
> > So I went to car shop and they did a pressure check and told me the
> > uppper hose is leaking. So I had them replece both upper hose and lower
> > hose, flush the coolant. Yesterday morning when the engine is cold, I
> > fill up the bottle to max. This morning I saw bottle lever went down
> > again.
> >
> > Can someone tell me if there are problems here? I appreciate your help.
> >
> > Thanks a lot
> >
>
> fill it one more time to be sure. it may just be air expulsion is the
> radiator guy did not burp the system properly.
>
> if it's still losing coolant, check the drain plug on the radiator - the
> seal may be leaking. if not, check under the car where the water pump
> drains through the timing belt cover. if there's coolant there, the
> seal's starting to leak. some "weeping" is normal. leaking preceeds
> failure.

<joseph_zhao99@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1128428398.539585.115230@g14g2000cwa.googlegr oups.com...
> Hi,
> I have a 98 Honda Accord at about 77k miles. About a month ago when I
> changed a light bulb, I realized that the coolant reservoir was empty.
> I never paid attention to the bottle before because I assume the guy
> who change my engine oil should fill it up. The engine temp is pretty
> steady, no overheat at all and I do not see any white smoke from
> exhaust. So I fill it up to max. About two week later, the coolant drop
> to min line. So I fill it up again. Ever since I start to realize the
> coolant level in the bottle decrease slowly since I check it in the
> morning when the engine is cold.
>
> So I went to car shop and they did a pressure check and told me the
> uppper hose is leaking. So I had them replece both upper hose and lower
> hose, flush the coolant. Yesterday morning when the engine is cold, I
> fill up the bottle to max. This morning I saw bottle lever went down
> again.
>
> Can someone tell me if there are problems here? I appreciate your help.
>
> Thanks a lot
>
If your radiator style is the same as my daughter's '93 Accord, look at the
top of the radiator where the brace crosses over it from front to back. Ours
has a flat spot (the rest of the top is domed) and it has developed a crack
from one side of the flat spot to the other right down the middle.
Apparently that flat area flexes and eventually cracks through, because when
I laid a bead of steel filled epoxy over it the crack continued through the
epoxy! It should have shown up on the pressure check, though.

Mike

joseph_zhao99@hotmail.com wrote in
news:1128456566.022492.255410@o13g2000cwo.googlegr oups.com:

> thanks for the rreply.
> I forget to mention, after they repalce the hose, they told me they
> did a pressure check again snd do not see any problems.


If the level keeps going down all the time, get them to do a pressure check
of the CYLINDERS. They will do this by screwing an air-line adapter into
the spark plug hole, pressurizing each one to 100 lbs or so, and looking
for bubbles in the coolant.

What they're checking for is a blown head gasket. If they find no external
leaks, you'd better be certain the head gasket is OK.


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