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I had Tony Waas heater bypass installed on my car and almost always drive with it on and the temperature setting set to cold, not that it matters since it bypasses the heater. Every few months I test it to make sure that the heater works.
It was cold a few weeks ago so I used the heater and turned it up and it worked fine, but I noticed a coolant leak of about 4 or 5 ounces under the car coming out of the passenger side hole that was drilled as part of the service bulletin to avoid having water collect near the resistor pack for the a/c controls.
Since then, I have a leak under the car a few hours or days after I park it, or I dont have a leak, but notice that their is one after I start up the car and pull out of the garage. I took off the front access panels and their attachments and didnt see anything leaking around the bypass valves, and also took off the front undertray to make sure the lines werent leaking where the pipes connect to the hose. The only thing that I noticed was a little wet was the connection underneath the heater matrix. There is a box that say Bergstom on it and it has 2 hose connections going into it. The area underneath the connection towards the front of the car is where it appears to be wet.
I am assuming that this is the heater core and since it is normally bypassed, no coolant would be flowing through it and that is why I never had a leak before. The bypass is shut off after the ignition is turned off, so maybe some coolant is flowing through heater core and leaking out later on? I have been experimenting to see what causes it to appear intermittently to no avail. I have been alternating leaving the temperature knob to hot when starting and shutting off the car, and vise versa but cant find a pattern.
But I was wondering, what happens when you turn the temperature knob up on the car to make it warmer? Since coolant is normally going thru the matrix when the system isnt bypassed, what makes the heater work? Is coolant going somewhere else instead that gets hot when you turn the knob and I am not looking in the right place? I just hope that I dont have a hole in the heater matrix housing that is causing the leak, since I cant figure out how to even access it.
It was cold a few weeks ago so I used the heater and turned it up and it worked fine, but I noticed a coolant leak of about 4 or 5 ounces under the car coming out of the passenger side hole that was drilled as part of the service bulletin to avoid having water collect near the resistor pack for the a/c controls.
Since then, I have a leak under the car a few hours or days after I park it, or I dont have a leak, but notice that their is one after I start up the car and pull out of the garage. I took off the front access panels and their attachments and didnt see anything leaking around the bypass valves, and also took off the front undertray to make sure the lines werent leaking where the pipes connect to the hose. The only thing that I noticed was a little wet was the connection underneath the heater matrix. There is a box that say Bergstom on it and it has 2 hose connections going into it. The area underneath the connection towards the front of the car is where it appears to be wet.
I am assuming that this is the heater core and since it is normally bypassed, no coolant would be flowing through it and that is why I never had a leak before. The bypass is shut off after the ignition is turned off, so maybe some coolant is flowing through heater core and leaking out later on? I have been experimenting to see what causes it to appear intermittently to no avail. I have been alternating leaving the temperature knob to hot when starting and shutting off the car, and vise versa but cant find a pattern.
But I was wondering, what happens when you turn the temperature knob up on the car to make it warmer? Since coolant is normally going thru the matrix when the system isnt bypassed, what makes the heater work? Is coolant going somewhere else instead that gets hot when you turn the knob and I am not looking in the right place? I just hope that I dont have a hole in the heater matrix housing that is causing the leak, since I cant figure out how to even access it.