My wife and I went on a little cruise yesterday that probably covered about 130 miles in the Olds. The car started running pretty warm. It was about 95° so I turned the AC off. No change. When we got home and the car cooled down, I checked the radiator, and it was way down on coolant. I looked closely and did not find anything that was obvious. There was nothing wet and nothing dripping under the car. The oil is fine. I am going to get a pressure tester from O'Reilly tomorrow and see what I can find. This car had been gone through literally bumper to bumper before I bought it. I was hoping I didn't have problems with it but it just proves you are never done with an old car. More to come.

 

Inspect the weep hole on the water pump. I've read a lot about water pump seals that leak only while driving, and the leaked coolant dries up, so no wet area as a tell-tale.

 

Thanks for the tip Kenneth. If that is the case then she was balling instead of weeping. It would be hard to see.

 

Not to be a pessimist but it could be a head gasket leak. I would do a warm compression test. If no leaks evident, maybe put your overflow hose into a catch can to see if the system is overpressurizing, or it could be blowing out the exhaust. You could also run it to temperature with the cap off and look for bubbling in the radiator.

 

Im not familiar with older Olds engines, but depending on the intake design intake gaskets can leak and pull coolant into an intake port.

 

Check the threaded drain plugs on side of the block. The Gray Ghost wagon had one rust thru and caused a similar situation. Frost plugs too. Nothing is above suspicion.

 

When was the last time the coolant level was checked? Can also be bad cap.

 

Pick up an infrared therm and find out what "pretty warm" actually is. Also use the thermometer around the radiator to determine if there are cool spots that could point to blockage. Is the bottom hose shruken or deflated, upper hose distended? Do you know the last time the cooling system received a thorough service? As said, pressure test the cap. Hope this helps....

 

Thanks for all the ideas guys. This engine was totally rebuilt by the former owner when he restored the car. It only has maybe 2,000 miles on it at the most. There is no water in the oil and the car was fine for much of the trip until the coolant level apparently dropped. The first thing I am going to do is get the pressure tester and pump it up and see if the leak shows up. I checked the coolant level Friday afternoon and added some. The cap is new but I will check it with the pressure tester tomorrow. As we all know, just because it is new doesn't mean it is good. Plugs in the block were replaced when the engine was rebuilt. More to come.

 

If you don’t see anything obvious, pull the plugs. If any are steam cleaned, then that’s a good indication of where the coolant is going.

If all that checks out, refill and drive it. Check the coolant every time before you head out on the road. Hopefully the level stays up where it’s suppose to be.

 

Thanks to all you guys for your help and suggestions. There is a great ending to this story. As I mentioned above, this car has not accumulated many miles since it underwent a pretty comprehensive restoration. About a year after the car was finished, the owner's health failed. He never got to get all the little bugs out of the car. This morning I went to O'Reilly's and borrowed a cooling system pressure tester. I put some more water in the radiator and as soon as I pumped it up to about 20 pounds, I heard water coming out, I looked under the car and it was coming out the lower radiator hose and the rear of the engine which was a heater hose clamp. This pretty well explains why I was not seeing any water under the hood because the radiator hose leak was going on the ground and the heater hose leak was blowing back on the rear of the engine and transmission. I tightened those clamps and pumped it back up and it held pressure. I did go over the rest of the clamps and tightened them a smidge. So, my all-in repair cost is a couple gallons of coolant. Sometimes the boogeyman wins but today I won, and the boogeyman can kiss my butt.
It is kind of funny, when my wife and I were on the way to the meeting place for the start of the cruise, the car was running so well that I said, "I don't think I would be afraid to drive this car anywhere". It will be a while before I say that again. Hope all of you are having a great day.

 

Outstanding Glenn, I LOVE easy inexpensive fixes that don’t consume gobs of time!!!👍

 

This is why diagnosis is so important. Congrats on a beautiful purchase

 

Thanks Heath. Are you going to be at the Zone Show in October? It would be good to see you.

 

That is a great outcome; glad you found the problem so quickly. I'm not certain what type clamps you have on your car, but if they have threads apply a drop of lock-tite liquid on the threads at the nut which will keep them tight and prevent back-off.

 

Thanks for the tip. Never heard that one.

 

I love a good ending.... Happy trails..... Tedd

 

It's always a great feeling when you discover that the problem was so easy to fix.

I actually have said the same about my '64, that I feel safer driving it long distances now than I did back in '98 (when it was in need of a radiator recore). And I always wince a little when I say it, because it's like I'm tempting fate. I suppose I should just shut up.

 

Trust me, I will never say that again. See what it got me.

 

Sometimes we tend to look for big problems instead of starting with the basics. I tend to be guilty of it from time to time. Glad you found it.