My car is bleeding!!

[christhekiddy]

i just got to work and when i got out the car could see steam coming from the front. When i looked the right corner of the radiator is leaking out water its only dripping. I couldnt see a crack or dent it seems to be coming from the bit right on the corner. Can it be fixed by welding it or will i need a new one??

If so how much are they??


Chris

 

[S22 JGS]

nasty... dont think rads are tooooo expensive

 

[Christopher]

more often than not it's the matrix that perishes

new rad needed unfortuantely.

 

[christhekiddy]

Would a second hand one be ok??

 

[Rich_16v]

Yes but they're only about £70-80 new

Try Advanced Radiators or somewhere similar

 

[christhekiddy]

They got a website?

 

[christhekiddy]

When changing the rad i can use all original pipes right?

 

[Christopher]

you sure can

inspect them first though, obviously

 

[philmots]

You cant weld up radiators... If i were you id pick up some of that 'radweld' from a petrol station its great stuff... I had a leak on my old Escort and it held for the 2 years i had it and prob still is now, only 5 quid too

 

[Mark5290]

It is possible for a radiator repair company to plastic weld a crack or small hole in a plastic radiator side tank, i have had it done to a radiator i had in a Chevrolet Camaro, unfortunately soon as the cooling system was up to temperature the weld opened up and it started leaking again, in the end they made me up a brand new radiator with copper end tanks.

Radweld and similar products are all good emergency 'get you home' type treatments but they don't cure the cause of the leak - only the symptom, i would be too worried about it blocking up holes it should'nt.

 

[jooliona]

^^ used radweld on my old car as a long term measure and when we eventually did replace the rad we found that 75% of it crumbled away in our hands! it will very likely block up more than the leaky bit so use with caution.

my clio is bleeding too so i'm getting a new rad put in by carlton garage next week. unfortunately its a much bigger job than that due to a previous "incident" but it will be good to have the car back to "new" again