DaKnown

As I got home from work a couple days ago I smelled coolant very heavy in the cab. When I checked the engine bay, I found coolant pouring out of a small tube in the firewall. I can't find a hose or clamp or anything to attach to the tube. It's a metal piece with an outward notch on each side as if something clamped onto and over the entire piece. This tube is about half way down the firewall and is pretty well lined up with the valve cover on the passenger side as far as how far into the engine bay it is from the side of the car.

I believe the heater line and return lines are a couple of lines running up higher on the firewall. But I can't seem to figure out what else would be pushing coolant through the firewall or how to fix this issue. I'm afraid to drive the car at all until I get this figured out so I just rented a car for now.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

8111870a

Sounds like heater core is shot, and coolant is running out the drain line.

Rockwell28

its your heater core it may be clogged. it will either need to be replaced which is very expensive bc of labor not parts or you could flush it or bypass it. I bypassed the heater core on my thunderbird i will just park it in the winter. you may be able to flush it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwo-v...eature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcL_0TWeZJY

DaKnown

Can it be driven like this or would that be a bad idea? I live in Nor Cal in the valley so the winter isn't too bad here. I could easily survive without a heater.

1998Slow 'Stang

Well, if you bypass it the engine knows no difference. I've had mine like this for some time. It sucks having no windshield defrost, but if you don't need it it doesnt really matter too much

turbo232

we ran my sisters old Cougar with the heater core bypassed for almost 300,000 miles. its no big deal unless you want heat.

cliffyk

You can block off the flow through the heater core on our cars with no issues. The heater return flow is directly to the water pump through the tube running through the block valley.

trailor

you can do the job on your own by removing the dash. it will probably take a while, just figuring out everything, but its really not that terrible of a job as it sounds. make sure you have a haynes or chilton manual, just in case. from what i've heard, any mech shop will charge you anywhere between $400-900, which i find to be a total rip since the heater core itself is maybe $50. here's what i found from a quick google search, shouldn't be much different, if at all, from a new edge:

http://www.moddedmustangs.com/forums...8-mustang.html

Rockwell28

yea you can run it just fine bypassed. I heard its a beast of a job to try and switch one out but like someone said the part is cheap its just the labor of getting to it. this vid is not a mustang but you get the point.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTgafl8nKI4

DaKnown

Thanks for all the posts. I got the hoses off and now I need to find something to tie them together so the coolant flows properly as bypassed. Just gotta wait for a ride.