fpena944

Just got my coolant tank in the mail today. Holy crap this thing is big!!!

You can only see a small corner of it but now I understand why he engine needs to be dropped and you need extra space to install it.

Well I'm taking this on in the next few days. And unfortunately we're hitting temperatures of over 100 degrees so that should be fun in my garage.

I'll post updates or questions...

LC MotorSports

It can be done without dropping the motor. You have to remove the airpump and a few other items and have some really small hands... TONS of beer is a big help as well . I stopped droping the motors several years ago.

fpena944

Even on a 2002 996 it can be done without the engine drop? I'll see what I can do this weekend but I'll plan on the drop if I have to.

Ubermensch

By dropping, you just mean lowering it a few inches on the mounts, right? That should buy you the clearance you need.

fpena944

Correct, I don't intend to drop the whole thing but to follow the instructions outlined here:

https://rennlist.com/forums/996-foru...an-02-a-2.html

Kazual99

Jinx.....I now have a coolant leak, but mine appears to be from the AOS region of the engine. SUCKS

fpena944

Awww man that is awful! Not the best weather to have this problem either. Well if you have to replace the AOS you might as well take care of the coolant tank at the same time.

Good luck!

Kazual99

How is your repair going? Are you starting today? As for the coolant tank, it was already replaced at 60K, so I'm good to go

fpena944

I'll start later tonight and then give myself all weekend if I need it to finish. Kind of hot right now so I'll wait until it cools off.

fpena944

Well I started the replacement of the coolant tank this morning and finished it by the afternoon. It is not at all a difficult job in terms of the skill needed but an absolutely frustrating job because you're dealing with fractions of an inch of space (or lack thereof) that makes everything a challenge.

The most intimidating part for me at first was dropping the engine. I had never done that for any car but in reality I now see it as my "go-to" move whenever I need to make more room in the engine compartment when doing a repair. It is VERY simple. Just two bolts and keep the jack in place and you're done.

But for me I still didn't have enough room when doing that so I had to also jack up the driver's side of the car a bit in order to really get some space there to pull it out.

What ended up being by far the most frustrating aspect of it was removing the right bolt on the black bracket that holds the tank. Omigosh it took me about an hour to get that stupid bolt out. And to top it off we hit a high of around 104 today so I was just pouring with sweat and couldn't have chosen a more miserable day to do it.

However at the end everything came back together again pretty easy and things look really good. No leaks now but I'm just going through the process of bleeding air out of the system. The only casualty in the whole repair was the oil filler tube which somehow (not sure what happened) cracked in half. You can see it in my picture below. I put it back together again with some "racing tape" but will be ordering a new one on Monday since I can't keep it like that for a long time. Oh and now I have some scratches on the driver's side intake manifold because of the process of forcing that tank in.

The photo below shows how much extra space I had to make in order to clear the way for this thing. But again, dropping the engine from it's mounts is so easy this is the least of your concerns when you're performing this repair.

If any questions, go ahead and ask while it's fresh in my head!

jordanturbo

A word of advice to people that have coolant leaks is to buy a cheap pressure tester and pressure check the system to find the leak before assuming what the repair is and spending time and money replacing the wrong part only to wast more money buying expensive porsche coolant after what you just replaced leaks out again.

I had a leak from a very similar position. I was driving home and then see a cloud of smoke behind me, I smell burning coolant and realizing I was the only one around assumed I had blown a head gasket or something and was burning. Upon getting home I popped the frunk and found my engine bay was covered in coolant (well that was a plus, no head gasket, just coolant dripping onto the muffler and burning) The coolant seemed to be concentrated around the resevoir and thought that is where it was coming from. Then I read about how regularly they seemed to fail I was convinced. After getting a new resevior from the dealership and decking my car to my shop I was getting ready to replace it when i decided for s**ts and giggles to pressure test the system.

When I put the system under pressure I saw coolant pissing out of a little T fitting off a line from the resevoir right under it. Part was under $20 and was quite easy to install, with remote hose clamp pliers I did it in under 10 min

fpena944

What a timely piece of advice!

I just came back from running errands and my heart sunk when I saw that I still have a leak. Not sure why it didn't happen yesterday after my test drives but it appears that coolant is still coming down from the back of the engine.

I hope it's just a line but afraid it might be the AOS. Well at least I replaced the coolant tank before it failed but ugh, this is the problem with replacing parts before testing. Great advice!

jordanturbo

Haha I was worried about that. I have this tool Blue Point Pressure Tester but you can find much cheaper ones. Fill coolant, attach tool, pump up, look for leak. Very easy to use. there is a coolant line off the bottom of the resevoir nearest the back of the vehicle. In that line there is a T fitting with a 1/4 inch or so hose branching off as some sort of vent line, for me it was the crack in that 1/4 inch vent line fitting.

Kazual99

Oh no! Not good

Kazual99

The coolant tank is known to fail, so it's not a totally waste. At least you know that the tank is good.