I just noticed that I’m losing coolant ... No leaks.... Is it evaporating..
Thanks
Kansas-Mike<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o>

 

You can't always see the leaks so there's stilll a chance that you have a leak. They're just hard to find sometimes. One thing you can do is do a double check on the water pump. If you have that coolant stain coming from the weep hole then its your pump leaking. If in fact you do not have a leak anywhere on the truck, then the only other way to loose coolant is that you have a leak in your block or head some where and you're burning the coolant in the engine. You'll know if this is the case if you have a whitish smoky looking exhaust that evaporates quickly after coming out the tailpipe. It will look like little puffs of white smoke (about baseball size) that vanish within 12 inches. This is not a good thing.

 

How much coolant are you losing? What engine do you have?

 

94 F-250 4x4 auto 460 ..... Would the tips of my plugs be white or yellowish.??
Maybe 1/2 gallon......

 

1/2 gallon in how much time? How many miles?

 

60 miles .... one week..........

 

In addition to what qman said check for leaks in the soft plugs in the block under the exhaust manifolds on both sides.

 

If you're loosing 1/2 gallon in 60 miles then you have a leak. My wife had an old Escort that had the cracked head problem which is how I know about burning it. There were cracks from outside through the water jackets and into the cylinder on every cylinder. It would loose a quart every 6 months (5000K mi) and the car ran strong. I didn't really know what was going on until I let the timing belt break and bent a valve that I found out what was really wrong. But I would think that 1/2 gallons in 60 miles would foul how your truck is running. And I don't know what water in the combustion chambers would do to plugs. But I'm sure it would show up big time in your exhaust and in how it runs. BTW what kind of truck/engine/miileage do you have and how does it run? If your truck gets 12 mi/gal like mine then you're burning 1/2 gallon of coolant for every 5 gal of gas. That's 12 oz of coolant for every gallon of gas so your gas would be 10% water. I would assume that would have a big impact on how your truck runs. Get under that truck and if you're engine is a V8 look at the freeze plugs. They're little round steel caps that are seated into holes in the side of the block to seal holes that are there due to casting of the block. Sometimes these things rust away and they'll leak. You would see a green coolant line coming from one of them. You should also see green stuff on the ground somewhere. Also check your heater core. I'm not sure where it is on these cars but if it is rotted you should find the green stuff on the floor in the cab or when you run your defroster it'll throw it up on the inside of the windshield and fog it up and give a sweet smell to the air (I've actually seen this happen.) Make sure to check all the hoses and where they fit onto. Leaks on the engine are not real easy to find if they're pinhole leaks because the stuff can evaporate rather quickly. I also have a Taurus and the overflow bottle had developed cracks in it and it had a pinhole leak in it which took me weeks to find. I kept finding coolant on the inner fender well beneath the bottle but couldn't find the leak. I finally pulled the bottle out and saw it spewing coolant. So if your exhaust isn't breathing little puffs of water vapor then you have a leak. Remember, all burning of fuels results in the output of carbon dioxide and water. So you will always see some moisture build on your tailpipe and drip off. But it's different when you're burning water. Your exhaust will actually be puffs of water vapor. They come out hot which is why they vanish so quickly after exiting the exhaust pipe.

 

94 F-250 4x4 auto 460 ..... 148000... Thank you for all of the suggestions... I have the white smoke but it lingers 2 or 3 feet and its pretty damn cool here......
The truck runs good... As for the rest of the list I will check it out this weekend....
Thanks again.....

 

You can also sniff your exhaust and if it has a hint of sweet smell then you could be burning it. Don't sniff it too much though or you'll kill yourself.

 

Kansas Mike, did you ever find your leak?

 

OK .. Sniffed the exhaust .... smelled more like oil then candy... Spent about two hours looking for anything that looked like coolant.... I still need to pull plugs and go buy some dye ........

 

Had it tested......And.... There is a hair line crack in the radiator.. I should be able to replace it... Couple hours couple friends couple beers... Thanks to qman and 88n94..

 

How about a couple beers for the qman and 88n94