I remember a car that a colleague was working on . . .
It was using a lot of coolant, and it wasn’t an external leak
Anyways, the engine was idling, and he had the block tester on there for a long time . . . possibly 1/2 hour or more . . . and then suddenly, without warning, the fluid instantly turned yellow and the temperature spiked
If your oil looks brownish black you are not much into car maintenance which may be why the har has given you a lot oft trouble.
To put Blue Devil into a car without pinpointing why it is losing coolant first is foolish. Some head gasket leaks only happen when the engine is hot. some water pumps only leak when the car is driving.
A bad radiator cap can let you lose coolant when the car ids driving and is pretty cheap to try.
I don’t know why everyone keeps scaring you with the idea of a blown head gasket when a radiator leak could be anywhere in the system. Since the mechanic didn’t find a leak and the coolant hasn’t mixed with the oil, I’m thinking you could have an electrical problem like I did with a Pontiac LeMans. It started after an oil change. I was repeatedly blowing a fuse with overheating, and overheating will cause loss of antifreeze too, even without a leak. The good news is the overheating was caused merely by 2 loose wires having been reconnected in the wrong way during the oil change, or perhaps they had just come loose and stayed that way, can’t completely remember now. The bad news is it took over a year for a mechanic to see the problem, and that was during a completely different repair.
I wonder if somehow the radiator fan wires on @CyndyC 's car got wired backwards, so the fan spun the wrong direction? That could lead to overheating, and would be difficult to diagnose since the fan would appear to be spinning like it should. That would be a very perplexing problem for a mechanic to be presented with I think. Something like that could happen if the radiator fan connector somehow got plugged in backwards after being disconnected for access for the oil change. I can see how that could happen. Definitely difficult to diagnose.
CyndyC is correct that the OP’s problem-cause remains unknown until further diagnosis is done. There’s no definite conclusions yet, head gasket or otherwise.
George and Cyndy, I have kinda noticed I get some good advice (for which I am thankful) and a lot of worst case scenario type stuff.
I’m getting the car back from the mechanic today, with some light diagnostic work and not much actual repairs done. I got some Blue Devil stuff and some stop leak, plus more coolant and some ramps so I can get under the car and do some of the work myself. Simple stuff, like draining fluids and such.
Got it back. Mechanic said the pressure test didn’t show any leaks. He had a guess that it was the water pump and some sort of “weep hole” near it. But this car is all jacked up and stuff is put in stupidly inconvenient places, he estimated about $800+ for the repair. The car has 135,000 miles on it and its Kelley Blue Book value is about $1000 (and that’s being charitable). God knows what the next thing to go wrong could be. That’s the rub… if I could plunk down $800 and know that I was gonna get at least a year without troubles I would… but with this high mileage and its history I doubt that.
Gonna put it on palliative care for now. Probably add coolant every week. $6 worth of coolant a week to nurse it along is something I can live with.
George and Cyndy, I have kinda noticed I get some good advice (for which I am thankful) and a lot of worst case scenario type stuff.
Maybe you and Cyndy should go back and re-read all the posts. Almost everybody advised that no one can know the cause without actually diagnosing the problem. When head gaskets were mentioned, they were brought up as a worst case scenario and advised you to find out why it’s losing coolant because if you keep letting it get hot enough, you could easily destroy the engine. You stated you have been allowing it to get low enough to get hot before adding coolant. That’s a recipe for enticing the worst case scenario so people are warning you. Wouldn’t you prefer to know the worst possible outcome so you can try and prevent it from happening? And by the way, it’s not a far fetched scenario, it doesn’t take but one overheating episode to cause significant damage…
Thrifty … fyi … re the water pump “weep hole”. There’s usually a small hole placed in the WP casing, near the spinning shaft of the water pump. If the water pump seal leaks, that hole is often the first place you see coolant dripping from. If you see coolant coming from that hole, it doesn’t mean there’s a problem with the “weep hole”, but that the water pump seal is kaput, it is on its last legs, and needs immediate replacement.
If it is the water pump leaking it can suddenly get much worse.
Just adding coolant once a week might get you stranded one day.
The pressure test isn’t always conclusive because coolant leaks can be intermittent.
Have you taken the time to do what I suggested in my last post?
i.e. watch the engine and radiator for leaks as it warms up from cold?
This costs nothing but a little time.
So I just gave up on this last week when it started overheating and it was NOT low on coolant. It had other issues too. Minor issues that I would have otherwise overlooked. This included some growing problems with the motors on the power windows (they were taking longer and longer to roll up and down and making some odd scraping noises). Also the DC power outlet thingie (where the cigarette lighter goes) doesn’t work. This makes it difficult to use my portable GPS which relies on this thing for power.
I dumped the Sebring and picked up a nice used 2000 Mitsubishi Mirage DE 4 door sedan. 54,000 miles on it and only $3000 bucks.
It had always been my intention to drive this car until it broke down and became too expensive to fix. I just expected it to happen later than 135,000 miles, and more dramatically. Oh well. I got 7 1/2 years and 110,000 miles out of it.
LOL… If your Sebring was a 2 door , it had a Mitsubishi engine and chassis.
As for that “nice used 2000 Mitsubishi Mirage . . .”
I HIGHLY advise you to treat it as if no maintenance has EVER been performed, because that may well be the case, for all we know
Oil and filter change
automatic transmission fluid and filter service
coolant drain and refill
brake fluid flush
complete timing belt job, if it uses it . . . you are WAY overdue, by time
Have the car checked out top to bottom, front to back by a good mechanic
Yes I was looking for maintenance schedules. What does the saying go? Hope for the best, expect the worst?
But do you really need a new timing belt after only 55,000 miles?
“But do you really need a new timing belt after only 55,000 miles?”
And 15+ years, yes you do.
There’s a recommended time limit, typically 7 years.
I don’t understand why the years have anything to do with it. It’s not a piece of fruit. It doesn’t just rot.
Actually it does. A rubber belt loses its integrity the longer it sits. It may or may not develop dry rot, but it definitely loses strength as it ages.
If that belt breaks because the rubber has deteriorated from age, and the engine is an interference engine, your engine may end up a piece of fruit. In an interference engine, when the pistons and the valves become seriously out of synch, they can bang into one another. That bends valve stems and can cause physical damage to the valve seats, the pistons, and sometimes even the cylinder walls.
Follow the good advice you’ve been given. If you don’t you may not get to enjoy the car like you should.
$3K for a Mirage sedan with only 54K miles on it, sounds like a good deal.
Thanks for the maintenance advice on the new car guys. I was thrown by the recommendation about the timing belt. I knew that timing belts were important but I thought the replacement time came much later, around 90,000 miles regardless of age.
I did a little further research and found that actually on the 2000 Mirage, they recommend the timing belt change at 60,000. Since I’m close on mileage and apparently overdue on age, I’m gonna add that to my list.
I’ve got a list of recommended maintenance items and I’m gonna pay my mechanic a visit today or tomorrow.
Every normal maintenance item has both a time and mileage limiting factor. If you don’t have one, and plan on doing your own service - or managing that service, get a service manual for the model. It can help in more ways than one, and help you fix simple stuff that might otherwise fool you.