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Car Forum / Nissan / Nissan Cars / July 200596 Nissan Sentra Using a lot of coolant. No drips.
I have a 96 Nissan Sentra which is using about a quart of coolant every 150 miles! There is no visible leak, no drip, no puddle. But there is sometimes a smell of antifreeze while the car is driven. A mech told me he noticed a sweet smell from the exhaust, but I do not notice it. There is no smoke of any color from the exhaust pipe. I had the cooling system pressure tested at a repair shop. They said it was fine, holding pressure well, and that the head gasket was OK, since the pressure didn't flutter while it was running. They tested it with the engine off and with it running. I pulled all 4 spark plugs. They look normal, just brownish/ rusty from being run for about 60K miles or so. (The mech said they looked normal, too). Each cylinder has some carbon deposition, and they all look about the same. (No "gleaming clean" cylinders cleaned by burning coolant.) Since tyhe cylinders don't look "steam cleaned", I am hoping I am not burning coolant internally. Since I can sometimes smell antifreeze while driving, I think it is leaking out somewhere and burning up right away. I've watched it idle and looked all over for a leak, or steaming coolant, never saw anything. The oil looks normal too. I haven't yet driven it up on ramps and looked at it from underneath while it idles. That's next, I guess. The car runs fine, and the temp is normal. Radiator cap is fine, according to the mech. (But it is awful easy to put on and take off). No bubbles in overflow reservoir. Any comments welcome! Thanks you likely have a blown head gasket, sounds like its not very bad yet but it will get worse > I have a 96 Nissan Sentra which is using about a quart of coolant every > 150 miles! There is no visible leak, no drip, no puddle. But there is [quoted text clipped - 34 lines] > > Any comments welcome! Thanks If you are smelling it when you drive, its a leak, not a head gasket. You need to look when the engine is cold. A quart in 150 miles is a very small leak, basically a drop every so often. That's not enough to make steam. When the engine is hot, a small drip evaporates before you ever see it. As the engine cools down and the pressure in the cooling system drops, a drop or two will survive that can be detected. Look for drops on the floor under the car in the morning before you start it up, also feel around the heater hoses and connections and the radiator hoses and connections for wetness and look for little puddles on the engine before you start it in the morning. Also check the oil for a milky appearance that would indicate water getting into it, but if they already checked and passed the head gaskets, you probably won't find anything in the oil. Another possibility is the radiator cap. If the cap is not holding the prescribed pressure, too much can blow out into the overflow and be lost when it overflows the overflow tank. One last possibility is a leak in the heater core. The symptoms include smelling antifreeze when you drive and a slimy build up on the windshield if you ever use the defogger. On 7/11/05 8:28 PM, in article 1121131714.625345.191830@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com, "SentraMench" <user132384@aol.com> wrote: > I have a 96 Nissan Sentra which is using about a quart of coolant every > 150 miles! There is no visible leak, no drip, no puddle. But there is [quoted text clipped - 36 lines] > > Any comments welcome! Thanks the smell is coming from his exhaust, indicating a head gasket leak, even though pressure tests are good, the leak could be small enough not to be detected but its still there, head gasket failure will happen > If you are smelling it when you drive, its a leak, not a head gasket. > [quoted text clipped - 61 lines] > > > > Any comments welcome! Thanks > the smell is coming from his exhaust, indicating a head gasket leak, even > though pressure tests are good, the leak could be small enough not to be [quoted text clipped - 86 lines] >>> >>> Any comments welcome! Thanks But surely, if it's coming from the exhaust, it won't smell like anti-freeze anymore because its gone through the combustion process. Since the OP does smell anti-freeze, then EMeyer's suggestion is on point. CD his mechanic said sweet smell, which comes from burned antifreeze, and yes yul smell it from the axhaust, ive had this problem on an 85 s-10 blazer and had a small leak in a head gasket that couldnt be found until the head gasket finally blew big time > > the smell is coming from his exhaust, indicating a head gasket leak, even > > though pressure tests are good, the leak could be small enough not to be [quoted text clipped - 92 lines] > > CD > his mechanic said sweet smell, which comes from burned antifreeze, and yes > yul smell it from the axhaust, ive had this problem on an 85 s-10 blazer and [quoted text clipped - 112 lines] >> >>CD OK, fair enough. CD I knew you had issues with Nisstech, but I never suspected you were psychic too. Where does he say there is any smell coming from the exhaust, or white smoke, or milky oil, or overheating that would indicate a head gasket? I suppose its possible, but I sure wouldn't be looking for that before checking all the likely sources first. I've experienced many anti-freeze leaks in 40 years of driving and have yet to smell antifreeze in the exhaust. Every time I've ever smelled any when driving, its been a heater hose or heater core. On 7/12/05 10:42 AM, in article LxRAe.147231$x96.7529@attbi_s72, "Sly" <askme@myserver.com> wrote: > the smell is coming from his exhaust, indicating a head gasket leak, even > though pressure tests are good, the leak could be small enough not to be [quoted text clipped - 72 lines] >>> >>> Any comments welcome! Thanks > I knew you had issues with Nisstech, but I never suspected you were psychic > too. Where does he say there is any smell coming from the exhaust <snip> Re-read the OP (first paragraph). His mechanic apparently said there was the smell of anti-freeze in the exhaust. Nirav not psychic, read his original post, his mechanic said there was a sweet smell from the exhaust, and i suppose my own personal experience of the same problem never happened? > I knew you had issues with Nisstech, but I never suspected you were psychic > too. Where does he say there is any smell coming from the exhaust, or white [quoted text clipped - 85 lines] > >>> > >>> Any comments welcome! Thanks actually its nisstech who has issues with me, ever since i first started posting here, hes jumped me quite often about how wrong i am > I knew you had issues with Nisstech, but I never suspected you were psychic > too. Where does he say there is any smell coming from the exhaust, or white [quoted text clipped - 85 lines] > >>> > >>> Any comments welcome! Thanks You're all wrong. Intake manifold gasket. Coolant is circulated through the intake. Gasket leaks and coolant gets sucked up into engine and burned, hence the smell. Happened to me on a different car. Compression test couldn't find it because it wasn't a head problem. > actually its nisstech who has issues with me, ever since i first > started posting here, hes jumped me quite often about how wrong i am [quoted text clipped - 116 lines] >> >>> >> >>> Any comments welcome! Thanks bad head gasket also does this > You're all wrong. Intake manifold gasket. Coolant is circulated through > the intake. Gasket leaks and coolant gets sucked up into engine and [quoted text clipped - 121 lines] > >> >>> > >> >>> Any comments welcome! Thanks > You're all wrong. Intake manifold gasket. Coolant is circulated through > the intake. Gasket leaks and coolant gets sucked up into engine and > burned, hence the smell. Happened to me on a different car. Compression > test couldn't find it because it wasn't a head problem. Thanks. Interesting. I was hoping not to muddy the waters with this next info, but I was getting a slow drip from the thermowax valve unit when the car was running, and still cold. After a few months of this slow external drip, it stopped. I thought, and the mech thought, too, that the coolant had started to leak INTO the intake from the thermowax unit,instead of out of it. Sooo, I rerouted the coolant hoses from the thermowax unit to bypass it, thinking that might stop the coolant loss. But it had no effect on it. Still used a lot of coolant. BTW, the thermowax unit is right under the throttle body (or the thing right next to it, sorry). It warms up from coolant and extends a rod which moves the high idle cam. The mech suggested this internal leak, but I thought " Why would the design of the car allow coolant to get into the intake from this thermowax area. All the thermowax unit needs is for coolant to go thru some passages near it, to hrat it up. Coolant doesnt have to actually touch the unit itself". But there was definitely coolant leaking OUT of the thermowax unit, so yes, coolant was touhing it. I guess coolant could also get INTO the air stream there, if the car was designed with a gasket or O ring sealing it from the intake. But, of course, rerouting the hoses arounf the thermowax unit didn't help !! Maybe there are some other areas for coolant to get sucked into the intake? Intake man gasket is one, of course. But why are my cylinders all showing "normal" carbon buildup? Wouldn't they be squeaky clean if I'm burning so much coolant? Thanks >>You're all wrong. Intake manifold gasket. Coolant is circulated through >>the intake. Gasket leaks and coolant gets sucked up into engine and [quoted text clipped - 31 lines] > > Thanks Let me mudddy the waters even more! This thermowax valve may be the mechanical equivalent of what I'm about to describe, but in my 98 Maxima, there's a coolant hose which routes coolant to the throttle body. There's possibly another place to consider. CD >>>You're all wrong. Intake manifold gasket. Coolant is circulated through >>>the intake. Gasket leaks and coolant gets sucked up into engine and [quoted text clipped - 38 lines] > > CD I don't know your car well, but check where the throttle body bolts to the intake. On my car, the gasket between the two was leaking coolant into the throttle body. I said intake in my previous post because I was too in a hurry to be specific, but that's where I found my mysterious leak. Of course if you by-passed the supply, this may not be it. |
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