92 taurus Antifreeze leak.HELP!!!!!

[breakNankles9119]

I have a 1992 ford taurs gl and I can't figure out where antifreeze is leaking from. I just changed my water pump, water hoses, thermostat. It doesn't overheat when I drive, it runs at the right temperature. When I stop steam comes up from under my hood, so i look and i can see it dripping ontop of my exhaust and that is where the steam is coming from. I have no idea what to do now. any ideas

[shorod]

Did you have the leak before you changed the water pump, hoses and thermostat? Did you doublecheck all hose connections, making sure they are fully seated and the clamps are tight and in the proper location? Is the coolant leaking on top of the rear exhaust manifold, front exhaust manifold, or the exhaust pipe behind the engine compartment?

You have a few options to track down the source of the leak. You can get a cooling system pressure tester which will allow you to pressurize the cooling system without the car running with the hopes that you will be able to see trace amounts of coolant trickling from where the leak is.

You would be able to do this in the comfort of your garage where you can get plenty of light to the area and not worry about the engine being hot or rotating assemblies of the engine spinning, etc.

If you have a blacklight or don't mind spending some money on a leak detection kit, you can add UV dye to the cooling system, run the engine to get it up to temp, then shut off the engine and use the blacklight to trace the leak to its origin. You will want to find that magic point where just a trickle leaks, otherwise the whole side of your engine may glow if you drive the car a few days before checking for the leak.

If you can describe a bit more accurately approximately where the leak is coming from, we may be able to point you to cooling system related components that could leak in that area. You may also want to make sure you didn't overtighten any of the hose clamps. It would be possible for a clamp to strip out and loosen if it were overtightened.

-Rod

[breakNankles9119]

Yea, I had the antifreeze leak before we changed everything.I already went through it all again and double checked that the clamps were tight enough, and they were. The leak is coming from the back of the engine, I just can't get a good look back there. I have tried looking from under the car when it was jacked up and still couldn't see where it was coming from. I believe that it is leaking ontop of the front exhaust manifold, under the water pump. Could the freese plug have anything to do with it?

[TaurusKing]

Did you change your bypass hose(s)?? I just did 2 on my kid's car, one split thought I'd take the easy way and do only 1, week later the other one went, not at the ends, but in the middle, surprised at how soft and gooey that hose was, split in 3 places.

[shorod]

And don't ignore the hoses that go to and from the heater core at the firewall.

-Rod

[breakNankles9119]

I will have to check that out, are those hoses on the driver side or passenger side. Could there be a possibility that the heator core has a leak or is clogged??? thanks

[shorod]

I believe on the '92 the heater hoses will attach to the firewall on the passenger side. If not there, then they may be centrally located in the firewall. These would be rubber hoses, not aluminium (and possibly insulated) rigid lines for the A/C evaporator core which will go in to the firewall in a similar locations.

If the heater core is leaking, you would most likely notice a sweetish smell inside the car when using the heater, and you may notice that the defroster is not effective and may even seem to fog up the windshield worse when used. In really bad cases, a leaky heater core may leave puddles of coolant on the passenger side floorboard.

I suppose it could leak out the weep hole for the A/C evaporator core and out the car from the firewall as well. There is probably a hose or tube exiting the firewall towards the bottom of the car on the passenger side that goes no where (but points towards the ground). This is where the condensation drains when using the air conditioning on a humid day, you know, that puddle of water that a car leaves when parked after using the A/C.

-Rod

[breakNankles9119]

Thanks for all of your suggestions. Now when I drive my car, I am not getting any heat at all. My temperature gauge is moving all around, but never in the red part of the gauge. I just topped off coolant level again, and it is doing the same thing. I didn't have to put that much in, so I don't think that there is a big leak. Could there be a possibility that there is a clog somewhere?

[shorod]

There could be a clog causing the lack of heat, but since the temp guage is moving around erratically, I'd suspect you have a bunch of air in the cooling system. There was a while when Ford had basically air purge valves on the cooling system, although I don't know specifics.

Did your thermostat have a jiggle valve by chance, and did you orient it in the 12 o'clock position when replacing it?

-Rod

[TaurusKing]

When I did my kid's rad, afterward there was a huge air bubble in the system, took a little while for it to purge out, caused the gauge to run up pretty good, no overheat though,, my 87 has the 2.5 engine with a 5 speed, that system has an air bleed on the thermostat housing.

[breakNankles9119]

I looked for the hoses that go into the firewall, and I located them right in the middle. There are two of them. When I let my car get up to temperature, I touched them and the driver side one was really warm/hot, but the passenger side one was not near as hot, and I dont know why. Could I get a lot of air in the system from opening the radiator cap a lot. I would drive it and the temperature gauge needle was running hot, but then it shot all the way down to where it usually is, the N in NORMAL, but most of the time it doesnt. Is there something wrong with the thermostat? Let me know of any thoughts, thanks

[pinang]

You might also wanna check your overflow tank that is connected to your window washer fluid tank. I had a similiar problem and it turned out that my overflow tank lid (the whole lid not just the cap) had sepperated just a tiny bit and coolant was leaking from the gap in between the white/yellow and black cover. It was like the glue that held the cover on had quit. and the top started comming off. A new one from the junk yard cost me $45