99' amigo coolant disappears?????

Hi,
I recently started having a problem with my amigo overheating. It started right after I had tromped on the gas to avoid a colission. After tromping I immediately smelled antifreeze. I took it to my mechanic and after testing suggested I replace the thermastat ($165- $15 parts, $140 labor) which I did.

The car ran fine for a few days and then began to overheat again. I took it back and found it was low on coolant. They ran a compression test for several hours to check for a bad head gasket and all the hoses. Everything checked OK. He filled it back up and asked me to keep an eye out for leaks.

Again after a few days the car begain to overheat. Again back to the mechanic and again low coolant. My garage floor is bone dry and they are completely baffled after running an over night compression test and checking for leaks.

His only suggestion and theory is that I have a bad cooling fan clutch that doesn't kick in when the engine gets hot. He thinks I'm losing the coolant through the reservoir hose from when the engine gets hot and blows the coolant out.

After testing it was found that the fan wasn't doing what its supposed to in kicking into high gear when needed. He wants to charge me $220 to replace the clutch but isn't 100% sure it will take care of the problem. This will be $400 spent on an overheating problem with no guarantee that it will be fixed.

Any ideas or healpful advice will be greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading.

Look on top of the block, under all the intake stuff and see if you see a puddle between the heads.

When you say "compression test" does that mean a cylinder compression test or did your mechanic pressurize the cooling system and check for leaks? If you were losing coolant through the overflow system, your overflow tank would be full and overflowing.

1998-1999 had a run of cylinder heads that were known to spring coolant leaks. Check for coolant in the spark plug wells. A sure-fire sign of a bad head.

G/luck
Joel

Thanks for your considerate reply. I passed it on to the mechanic and he had checked.

Look on top of the block, under all the intake stuff and see if you see a puddle between the heads.

Thanks for the reply. He acually did do both types of test with frustratingly no results. He did find that after running the car for about 5-7 minutes that the resevoir was indeed full which lends credibility to his original thoughts. Thanks for your suggestions.

When you say "compression test" does that mean a cylinder compression test or did your mechanic pressurize the cooling system and check for leaks? If you were losing coolant through the overflow system, your overflow tank would be full and overflowing.

Thanks for the reply Joel. I did have them look for that as well. After all consideration, we are going to move ahead with the fan clutch. He did give me a price break on the labor so that makes it a little easier to swallow.

1998-1999 had a run of cylinder heads that were known to spring coolant leaks. Check for coolant in the spark plug wells. A sure-fire sign of a bad head.

G/luck
Joel