(T) erratic idle..coolant loss..power loss

car is 97 cinq sx which i picked up very cheap a few months ago..been doing some b/work and gen bits myself but now have a prob..
went for a spin this morn and after a few miles cinq started to lose power and gradually ground to a halt and coolant seemed to have disappeared also but upon refilling with trusty bottle of water it started to diss again but no external sign of leakage..managed to get cinq home but everytime we slowed down she cut out.. lost two litres of coolant in a 3 mile trip but no idea where..also now have excessive smoke out tailpipe and have smoke coming out exhaust joints underneath..
car was/is to be used to help my teenage daughter to drive later this year..main family car is a 4wd 8 seater
any help please..

You need to find where the water is going. Make sure you bleed it when refilling, then run it until you see the water coming out. If it doesn't then its possibly the headgasket. If the headgasket has gone its more than likely there is fault somewhere, possibly the cooling fan motor, or radiator itself.

Its a fairly straight forward wee engine to work on, Couple of hours should see it stripped, then off to the machine shop for a head skim (not you, the car's head), new gasket set and couple of hours to get it back together again.

Cheers

D

i agree. Headgasket could explain all those symptoms.

will try your suggestions 2moro ..have a feeling you could be right about the h/gasket as i had a tipo many moons ago that fell sick similar to todays probs...only remembered after i posted..i`ve had so many cars in my 30 years of driving that sometimes i forget some of the ailments they suffered from!..the cinq is the 20th car i have owned since 1977

Have a look in your coolant bottle and smell for exhaust and look for an oily film. More than likely it's the other way around with water getting into the engine (if it is indeed a HG) in which case there should be white gunk in the oil.

It might also be a rotten radiator, dodgy water pump or simply a leaking/split pipe. Go for a drive to run it up to temperature and park it up with some cardboard underneath to see where it could be dripping from.