Club 80-90 Forums

Just brought a 2.1dj 89 van , had it about a month now and it seems to be loosing coolant somewhere , first time i checked was after 300 miles , top tank was empty took 1 litre to get back to max mark , how long it had been this low i dont know , i just went out to check it again and top up tank was empty after about 100 miles max , it took 1 litre again to fill it. van drives fine doesnt over heat and i cant see any obvious leaks , ive checked around header tank and hoses but just cant see anything.

im going to keep a eye on the coolant level over next few days just to be see how fast its going.

any ideas folks new to all this water business

Get it warm, give it a short but hard run and stop quickly, open the lid (get's everything nice and pressured up) and see what's weeing out.

Usual suspects are :-

Cracked header tank (very common and often hard to see at first when cold)

look around the bottom of the metal water pipe (left side of engine bay), looks pristine on top but rots out on the bottom

the flange out of right hand bank of cylinders

and under the water pump (there's a gland drain hole) which coolant runs out of if the pump's bu&&ered

the oil cooler's another possibility (where the oil filter screws on)

Then you can start on the hoses, front-back radiator pipes and ditto heater hoses, (for the air cold viewers that's the part that allows you to see through the windscreen without scraping the inside )

Good luck, Ian.

Get some cardboard and put it under your van you will soon see where its leaking from

My van was the same, It wouldnt keep any water in topup tank, But never overheats and guage fine, rises a bit in trafic, fan comes on, guage goes down. Always the same. So i gave up putting coolant in topup tank. levels never change in header tank. It seems to be the way the van likes it. I used to have an old golf which was the same. Never understood it but never gave me any probs.

funbus1 wrote:My van was the same, It wouldnt keep any water in topup tank, But never overheats and guage fine, rises a bit in trafic, fan comes on, guage goes down. Always the same. So i gave up putting coolant in topup tank. levels never change in header tank. It seems to be the way the van likes it. I used to have an old golf which was the same. Never understood it but never gave me any probs.

sounds as exactly like mine , what i cant understand if was loosing water from a hose or elsewhere surley it would keep dropping , it lost exaclty same amount over 300 miles as 100 miles.

check the hose from the pressure cap to the top up tank, and the cap its self.
the top up tanks are also known to crack along the seams, which you cannot see with out taking it off the mountings

also worth looking at the heater valve above the spare wheel.....

Steve. Surely if therse a crack or leaking hose it would continue to empty the system? I check my level often and it very very rairly needs topping up maby once every 6 to 8 months, I just top back up the header tank.

I had exactly the same problem and changing the cap on top of the main tank and the hose from here to expansion tank solved it. Not sure exactly how the cap works but it has a pressure valve in it and I figure that this wasnt working correctly ?
Cheers,
Dave
( www.vwcamperguide.com )

Sorry i ment to ad, i have just changed my header tank, cap and hose. And it was like this before and after the work was done.

air in the system?

alternatively if it is not leaking outwards perhaps it is leaking inwards?

the system is pressurized but you only notice external leaks under alot of pressure, so it must be at operating temperature (10 - 15 mile drive) before you look for holes to plug.

clartsonly wrote: the system is pressurized but you only notice external leaks under alot of pressure, so it must be at operating temperature (10 - 15 mile drive) before you look for holes to plug.

Which is what I was saying in the 10 minutes of typing our friend ignored

Ian.

Ian Hulley wrote:

clartsonly wrote: the system is pressurized but you only notice external leaks under alot of pressure, so it must be at operating temperature (10 - 15 mile drive) before you look for holes to plug.

Which is what I was saying in the 10 minutes of typing our friend ignored

Ian.

if that comment was aimed at me , ive not ignored any comments , im going to look into it later after work , all help is well recieved thanks

funbus1 wrote:My van was the same, It wouldnt keep any water in topup tank, But never overheats and guage fine, rises a bit in trafic, fan comes on, guage goes down. Always the same. So i gave up putting coolant in topup tank. levels never change in header tank. It seems to be the way the van likes it. I used to have an old golf which was the same. Never understood it but never gave me any probs.

My camper and current velle are exactly the same, header tank never drops, top up cant hold water, gave up in the end, 24,000 miles on the camper with no probelm......

there are various "o" type seels, such as on the temp senders, on a 20 year old van there is a good chance they have perished, also there is one on the top of the header tank sensor . other places could be the heater matrix in the cab, not obvious places to look but worth a go if you can't find anywhere else

found the problem , it was a little rubber hose that joins to oil cooler , problem was i was checking before it got hot and it was just evaporating on the hot engine , took it for a run , stopped before it warmed up and i could see it leaking out quite fast , anyway got the part on order from VW cheers for the advice folks.