Hi there, have had a browse of old threads re overheating puntos but wondered if anyone had anything to add. My situ is this:-

• 1998 punto, reasonable mileage owned nearly 2 years.
• Had new head gasket in May 2010 as overheating constantly. Fine after this.
• Had new battery last week due to cold and while it was in the garage. Aldo putin a smallbottle ofcoolant into the tank.
• Prior to this the light on the dash (the red one near the petrol indicator) had been coming on during quite short journeys.
• I thought it was just low coolant but even after refilling it is still coming on during short trips.
• Heater only blowing cold air. To be honest haven't specifically checked for leaks but not noticed any puddles etc like before HG repaired.

My question is this - do I add more coolant (as onlysmall bottle added) or is it something dreadful which is going to require more cash? I've also seen this K Seal / Radweld stuff - is that worth a go? This car is ideally going in the Summer when I buysomething newer so only needs to last until then.

Any help, opinions and advice welcomed!

V

Kangaroos114 said:

Hi there, have had a browse of old threads re overheating puntos but wondered if anyone had anything to add. My situ is this:-

• 1998 punto, reasonable mileage owned nearly 2 years.
• Had new head gasket in May 2010 as overheating constantly. Fine after this.
• Had new battery last week due to cold and while it was in the garage. Aldo putin a smallbottle ofcoolant into the tank.
• Prior to this the light on the dash (the red one near the petrol indicator) had been coming on during quite short journeys.
• I thought it was just low coolant but even after refilling it is still coming on during short trips.
• Heater only blowing cold air. To be honest haven't specifically checked for leaks but not noticed any puddles etc like before HG repaired.

My question is this - do I add more coolant (as onlysmall bottle added) or is it something dreadful which is going to require more cash? I've also seen this K Seal / Radweld stuff - is that worth a go? This car is ideally going in the Summer when I buysomething newer so only needs to last until then.

Any help, opinions and advice welcomed!

V

Click to expand...

Hi,

first... radweld/k seal... works "Sometimes"
but it is ill advised.. might fix the problem, but can clog up heater matrix's and car radiators or at least reduce the efficiency of them.

you put a small bottle of coolant in?
if it didnt have antifreeze coolant in it, that is not the proper way.. proper way is

• to drain by removal of bottom hose normally,
• flush (with cold engine) backflush with clean water until water runs clear
• put hoses back,
• look up antifreeze quantity
• if it says 4 litres.. because it is 50/50 you put 2 litres of neat antifreeze into the engine which is 50% of the total coolant required,
• then top up with water until full... preferably distilled, as distilled has many advantages over tap water.. but tap water wont harm the engine... long term it can cause heater matrix and radiator clogging over a period of years... which is why distilled is always recomended as it can prevent that...especialy if you live in a hard water area.. only have to look at what tap water does to your kettle.. it will do that to the inside of your radiator and heater matrix as well.. distilled water wont.

Reason you dont mix antifreeze and water first in a bucket or something then put in, is because..it doesnt account for any plain water left in the heater matrix and bottom end of the engine which will weaken the overall antifreeze strength... so by putting the 50% antifreeze in first, you will always have the correct amoutn of antifreeze in the engine. Then just top up with water.

then you bleed any trapped air out of the heater hose on the back of the engine, right hand side.. and top of the radiator right hand side.

some MK2B dont have the bleed point on the heater hose located on the rear of the engine right hand side.. as it has a hose instead that goes back to the radiator to automatically bleed... but radiator still requires bleeding.

In your case, because the heater is not getting hot and remaining cold first of all, try bleeding the system to get any air out as an airlock can cause overheating.. and it sounds like trapped air.

If there is no air in the system, and it still overheats could be the thermostat stuck closed.. after bleeding once your sure theres no more air in the system.. check the top radiator hose, right hand side gets hot when the engine warms up, if it does thermostat "should" be working, if it remains warm or cold, thermostat is no good which is whats causing the overheat, as it wouldnt be allowing the coolant through the radiator to cool it down.

But im leaning more in the direction of air in the system at the moment because your heater is not getting hot, rather remaining cold.

In which case.. DO NOT run the engine too much with air in the system, as it can blow the head gasket again... if it hasnt already.

If the head gasket has blown again, I would persue it under warranty.. should have 12 months or 12k miles at least if it was done by a Garage.. if its not, then trading standards willl be interested... and if it has blown again, which im sorry to say sounds like it may of, it was not properly repaired back in may.. was the head skimmed?

Reason why I think that is because from what I can gather.. it was overheating, you put a bottle of coolant in, because it was low? which would of caused the trapped air...well it should not of lost the coolant in the first place, and it was that loss of coolant that started the chain of events

Lost coolant --> overheating --> Trapped Air --> topped up --> trapped air still present which is why its still overheating.

If it did not loose its coolant to begin with, it would not of got trapped air, you would not of had to top it up etc.

my car, had since 11 months old.. 3 years old nearly now and ive only topped up with a very small amount 1ce just this week.

Then, keep an eye on the coolant levels, if they are dropping or staying the same.. under normal circumstances.. should not loose ANY coolant from an engine, as theres nowhere for it to go... being its a sealed system.

Radweld is OK (the small bottle for about £5) will temporarily fix pinholes in the rad matrix. It wont cope with splits from frost damage.

Kseal or WonderWeld are a alleged to fix blown headgaskets but risk clogging the radiator and coolant waterways inside the engine.

So best course of action to go to the garage who did my head gasket and ask them to look into it? Presumably all this trapped air thing should've been done when they chnaged out the HG? The overheating light thing only started a little while ago though. Was totally fine after it had the new HG hence why I thought it may be unconnected?

Thanks for all the technical info - not sure what to do with it as not much of a petrolhead but at least I can mention trapped air and stuff to the garage man!

Kangaroos114 said:

So best course of action to go to the garage who did my head gasket and ask them to look into it? Presumably all this trapped air thing should've been done when they chnaged out the HG? The overheating light thing only started a little while ago though. Was totally fine after it had the new HG hence why I thought it may be unconnected?

Thanks for all the technical info - not sure what to do with it as not much of a petrolhead but at least I can mention trapped air and stuff to the garage man!

Click to expand...

If a cylinder head is not skimmed, and the cylinder head is put back onto the engine and is not flat, it might take some time, but it can cause a repeat failure.

all i was saying is, if your loosing coolant.. thats what is causing the air lock which you are experiencing because of the cold heater, which in turn is causing the overheating.

so coolant must be going somewhere, as you shouldnt be loosing any coolant.

and only places it can go is, leaking radiator/heater matrix, damaged hoses, leaking coolant pipe, or through the head gasket internally inside the engine.

firstly, check for any obvious signs of leaks, like antifreeze marks, wet patches.. dripping water, wet carpet in the footwells inside, visually examine the hoses. Do this first, because if a garage finds a leak they will charge you for repair as its unrelated to the head gasket.

then if you cant find any leaks..id advise you dont mention anything about the air in the system..just say, your loosing coolant and the engine is overheating and let them make their own diagnosis.. if they come to the conclusion head gasket.. then you can say.. but you only changed it a few months ago? why has it gone again and question it, and demand they put it right for free as any work they do has to be warranted as a garage.. warranty usually is 12 months or 12k miles... and they have to provide some kind of warranty on that work... because if it fails within that time the work was not fit for purpose and trading standards will be interested.. its 1 reason why garage servicing doesnt void a cars manufacturer warranty, but self servicing does. But dont mention anything other than loosing coolant and overheating, because if you mention air... they can question how you know that? and if you say you checked the bleed points they can easily try and turn the blame onto you and use it as a get out clause for not warranting it..and you can argue that its not supposed to loose coolant, especially after just having the head gasket done... they are a sealed system after all, nowhere for coolant to disappear to lol.

no head gasket should fail within 12 months if properly done.

air trapped thing isnt directly related to the original head gasket repair.. if they did it properly they should of bled the air out, and your heaters etc should of worked normally.

what looks to of happened possibly, is head has not been skimmed, gasket has failed again..which has caused a loss of coolant into the engine.. which has created a new airlock.

do need to be tactfull though with garages as they use any excuse, I recently did a head gasket on an MG TF K series 1.8 160 VVC engine.

A main dealer did a head gasket repair on it, and shortly after they still kept on loosing water.. had to keep topping it up, dealer even told them thats normal and to just keep topping it up.. had the car back several times but failed to do anything about it... in the end they was shoving nearly a litre a week of coolant into the engine.

I pulled it apart, and found they had put a 2nd thermostat inside the engine where there should not be 1, and they had broken the seals on the cylinder liners.. pulled everything apart, resealed the liners, put it back together properly.. and that was 6 months ago, owner hasnt had to put any coolant into the engine.

But it goes to show even main dealers make a horrific mess of something as simple as a head gasket job, and they will use any excuse to get out of repairing it.