Puddle of Green Fluid

I have been storing my car, 1986 328 GTS, in the garage all winter. Everything has been going great, until today!!

My wife came home this morning and asked if I have noticed the puddle of water at the back of my car? What puddle I immediately asked!! The puddle of green fluid that was on the floor behind your car in the garage.

I was just out there earlier in the day tinkering inside and did not notice anything. I need to walk across the back to get to the drivers door, so I would have to have noticed the puddle if it was there earlier in the morning.

Anyway, there is a puddle of green fluid on the floor right under the engine compartment. After further examination it is antifreeze fluid. The origin is still unknown. I plan on taking a closer look tomorrow when I have more time.

Any ideas? Why would I spring a leak when the temps are in the 50’s? It has not been started since last October and I know the leak just surfaced today. I wiped up the original puddle and nothing more has surfaced.

Puzzled and scared to investigate

 

WP seals going?

 

Overflow bottle got brittle during the cold months and cracked?

 

(Although anything's possible), it's probably just a loose hose clamp on one of the large coolant hose connections -- the rubber hose compresses with time (which reduces the clamping force), and when cold, everything shrinks in directions that work to further reduce the clamping force between the rubber hose and aluminum coolant tube -- if you started it (and heated it up), it would probably be sealed OK during operation even under pressure (and then pee on your floor at night ). I had a similar problem (exaserbated by the poor quality of some of the aluminum coolant fittings on the TR) and found that on most diesel equipment (that is left outside in frigid cold -- so the temperature swings are really large), they use constant-torque screw clamps on the more inaccesible coolant connections rather than the direct screw-type clamps:
http://www.breezeclamps.com/ct.htm
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Would heating the garage solve that issue?

 

Hopefully it is simple and inexpensive. I found the green puddle on mine last week in the front. Diagnosis is radiator needs repaired. I will have it done during the major next month.

 

It would help a little bit (anything that reduces the difference in temperature between operating conditions and storage conditions would), but it's not really a super-serious problem in any case IMO (as long as getting access to do the fix isn't a problem) -- using a good quality silicone coolant hose with the stock clamps at the majors and you'd rarely have a problem (and even if you did just touching up the clamps would probably fix it so no biggie on a 308/328).

 

Don't be too upset. It IS a 20 year old car .....**** happens. One possible preventative measure....drive it as often as possible. This keeps all the parts warm, juicy, and happy.

Tom

 

Heh, heh, heh.....

 

Thanks to everyone who replied. I removed the rear passenger wheel and the fiberglass fender insert. No antifreeze fluid. I thought the water pump might be leaking, but that wasn't the cause of the original puddle. Next weekend I will remove the driver’s side wheel and fiberglass fender insert to see if I can isolate the cause.

 

I had the EXACT same thing happen to me - using a cooling system pressure tester ($100 gizmo that looks like a small air pump that you attach to your coolant expansion tank), I found old hoses/clamps were seeping coolant, and coolant was coming from the weep hole of my water pump. I pretty much had to tear everything down to 'parade rest', as this was a good time to have the radiator rodded-out as well......

I had the whole water pump/termostat mechanism sent to Durable1 for a complete rebuild and bench test, and now I'm looking to replace sections of coolant hose with Gates Green Stripe in 1 5/8" with fresh hose clamps. Once the hoses are on, and every hose clamp re-torqued, I'll refill and test for leaks this week.

 

Excellent suggestion -- I also bought the Stant 12270 to track down the (cold) leak I was having (and it was actually multiple leaks):

http://www.stant.com/brochure.cfm?brochure=578&location_id=183

 

Check the expansion tank as they rust through with age. Mine leaked from there, as we have no support here in china, I took it off and used solder on the whole of the bottom part of the tank. It has lasted for two years so far but now I am having small holes on the top of the tank. So I will repair it the same way until I get a replacement one.

 

Yep, I have the STANT as well.....I've found that the cold coolant leaks are also a source of air entering into the cooling system, causing engine overheating in stop-and-go traffic. For the system to work well, everything must be completely air/water-tight.

 

I just got back in from removing the driver side rear wheel well insert to see if I could locate the anti-freeze leak. I could not. Fortunately, this did give me the opportunity to tighten numerous loose bolts and clamps!!!

After not locating the leak and not finding any additional anti-freeze on the ground over the last two weeks, I decided to take her out of hibernation and start her up.

She started on the first try. It took several seconds for the oil pressure to rise; that is always a little scary!!!

Here’s my dilemma and need for expert advice. After she first started she smoked a little (normal), but after running for about 10 minutes she was smoking more. It was a white smoke; not blue or dark. I turned off the car and came in to ask advice. Is this just condensation that has built up in the exhaust since being stored since October 1, and the current temp, is only 40 or have I possibly blow a head gasket?

Can you blow a head gasket just sitting in the garage in the winter? What can I do to verify? Should I let it run and see if it goes away after warming up more?

Any assistance would be very much appreciated.

P.S. I just went out again after typing this to see if there was any anti-freeze on the ground and there is not.

Scott

 

Yes, of course! If it's got a blown head gasket (unlikely IMO), operating it rationally won't hurt anything significantly more (and running it for a long enough time to rule out condensation would be the first diagnostic test anyway) -- just watch the instrumentation for normal or abnormal behavior.

 

Thanks Steve. Unfortunately, the temperature dropped in MN and with 20 w 50 in the car I think I’ll wait for the temperature to warm up a little until I start the car again. Hopefully, it will get around 50 F this weekend.

 

It warmed up in MN today, so I went out in the garage and brought the car up to temperature without incident. No leaks or water puddle. The original puddle had to be from the overflow tank. I cannot think of another explanation. Hopefully by the end of the month it will warm up and dry out enough to bring it out of storage for the year.

Scott1967