Radiator weep after fan failure and overheating

[frankgoldstar]

Dear All,

some of you may have seen my posts about blundering through a fan change.

For all my sins, I was ably and generously supported by SD1Too (Simon, Arctic and Jules, among other, who were all instrumental in levering me out of the hole I dug.

However, the happy fan that resulted was somewhat spoiled by the fact that the radiator them started to weep.

Further investigation (the front of the car can now leap off when whistled) revealed it was apparently not related to any of my ham-fistednes, but seemed to be the coming from where the vertical radiator ends.

It was not a large amount of water loss, but even so, obviously had to be fixed.

I postulated that as the car had overheated when I was stuck in a traffic jam and the fan died, the radiator had suffered.

This seemed a reasonable conclusion, as there had never been any water loss up to that point.

And as soon as the new fan was working, the header tank was checked and a very small amount topped up, with no evidence of water loss until the engine got good and hot.

It them dripped steadily and seemed to be increasing.

As I am working away from home from this weekend for a couple of weeks,
I decided to pick the rad from an 06 75 in a scrapper that had "donated" the fan.

However, this involved motorway driving to get it, so I read a lot of the very useful posts on this site involving radiator sealants.

On the basis they are not a permanent fix and bearing in mind the rad change involves a complete coolant charge, I got a bottle of Wynns "Stop Leak" and bunged it in.

The weeping stopped almost right away and I have done some 90 miles with it in since and the water level has remained constant.

I will, of course, swap the radiator (the donor was still full of fresh OAT, so that is a very good sign) as soon as I get back, but I thought I would report both the radiator failure, with some theory as to why it did and the successful temporary fix.

As an added benefit, I also got the air-con condenser thrown in, which is in immeasurably better condition than the current one, so I might have a chance of cold air.

TC or Simon commented in an earlier post that my original condenser would not be in good condition, but that is an understatement.

The tree leaves stuck around it had more structural integrity than the condenser, which crumbled at the merest touch!


Best wishes, Frank B

[SD1too]

Originally Posted by frankgoldstar

... my original condenser would not be in good condition, but that is an understatement. The tree leaves stuck around it had more structural integrity than the condenser, which crumbled at the merest touch!

I'm renewing mine at the moment Frank. It's showing signs of leakage and fins which turn to dust when they're touched. It is 18 years old mind so I can't complain!

Simon