Mrmerlin

Do you have the WSM using it will answer most of your questions.
The expansion valve is under the black cowl just about center of the car, its silver.

The heater lines go under this,
if one of the heater lines is leaking,
then the coolant will come out of the black rubber oval drain cover,
thats in your first picture maybe thats what your seeing

MainePorsche

From PET. Hope it is useful.
Your expansion valve will be the silver rectangular box which goes into the two horizontal openings as seen in the air housing unit in pic 1.

Bonton

I think this could be the case, that the coolant is leaking into the area below the cowl, i.e. "black rubber drain cover" which I noticed yesterday and wondered what exactly it was.

So since there really isn't anything in the engine bay that is leaking and there is coolant just below the drain cover mentioned above, What are the likely culprits, what shall I be looking for as I lay prone on top of the engine with the cowl cover open?

Thanks for any help, I am ready to get this resolved/figured out so that I can get back on the road.

Josh

MainePorsche

Line 1 is hot water to heater core after heater valve opens. Line 2 is hot water out and back. (Pic 1).

Bonton

So besides the in/out hoses- I imagine the heater core could be leaking too or would my floor be wet?

Mrmerlin

its probably a loose clamp at the heater core fittings,
kinda tricky to tighten,
these lines dont usually leak however.

Bonton

Well that's "easy" enough to check out. So is it common or not for the heater cores to fail and if so what are the obvious signs that definitely indicate heater core failure (not to focus in the most catastrophic.) I hope it's only the clamp connections.

Bonton

Well I took off the cowl and located the two heater supply hoses and took the supply (top) one off. Peering downward beyond the return line the bottom of the cowl showed coolant.

I pryed up the supply line clamp and it rotated the whole hose a bit so I could get it in better position to actually reach with a screw driver other wise it was directly behind the wiper motor. I got it into position and loosened it, got it into a better position and tightened it while holding below with another screw driver so that it wouldn't rotate. So it's as tight as I could get it. Cleaned the top nipple and put the hose back on.

Warmed it up around the neighborhood then took it to the highway and got on it, soon the coolant light came on.

Dang, so the ONLY thing I can think to do at this point is get a 1/4 inch ratchet on it and try to tighten it down some more. I did not remove the hose from the nipple to inspect....geeez - it lowered the expansion tank by an inch below the seam and I'd filled it past the seam!

When I got home I pulled in, jumped out and put a light on the hoses expecting a gusher but nothing really. What is up with this hose?

So I guess all I can do is torque it down, right? Should I pull it, cut it and reattach? Ugh. Total PITA.

Josh

Mrmerlin

at this point I would be ordering new hoses,
and starting fresh,
the original hoses are 25 years old

MainePorsche

+1

FredR

Josh,

If as Stan suggests you have original hoses still fitted firther discussion is somewhat mute until you replace them.

Have you tested the hoses for plasticity -i.e. squeeze them to see if they compress and return immediately- or do they compress like a piece of wet cardboard?

Apologies if I am missing anything but i think we covered first base in my first post to this thread.

Also agree with Stan that these hoses are not normally troublesome where they connect so if the connection to the heater is the root problem most likely the hoses are toast and no amount of tightening will help unless they are new hoses and someone duffed out tightening them but then this should have been pretty obiovus the minute you put a screwdriver on the clamps.

Regards

Fred