Today a message warning appeared saying excessive radiator fluid. I assumed this was because the engine was too hot or overheating. Topped up water. But then realised heater inside car was blowing out cold air and not warm despite it being on warm setting.
I was wondering if there is a link to the warning light?
It only came on once and not appeared since.
I took the car to garage as precaution and the said something about a possible leak. They are running a diagnostic to find out and will get back to me regarding any work.
Has anyone else experienced cold or cool air blowing from heaters even though set on warm?
Also garage said of there is a leak that if work needs to be carried out it would also need the belt replaced which I did not expect.
Does anyone know if a belt would also need to be replaced as weLloyd as water leak sorted?
Is the heating water system linked to this belt?
Many thanks

What car is it?

Modern engines have very little coolant inside the engine. This gives a fast warm-up time but means any loss of coolant can cause sudden damage such as blown head gasket. The Fiat 1.2 and 1.4 FIRE engines are especially at risk from low coolant.

Over-pressure can be caused by a blown head gasket pressurising the cooling system or by the coolant boiling which usually leads to a blown head gasket. A garage can do a chemical test to look for hydrocarbons (petrol basically) in the coolant. But if you can hear a gurgling noise from the heater and the coolant level is low, it's likely you already have a blown head gasket.


On some models (e.g. Panda 100 HP and Eleganza) which have climate control (thermostatic heater controls) the flaps inside the heater box can fail so that warm and cold air are not mixed correctly. This is clearly annoying but will not harm the engine.

As Dave says, it helps to know what car were talking about, but in general terms -

Excessive would be too much, rather than too little, suggesting not a leak but that fluid isn't getting everywhere it needs to. Not sure where the fluid level sensor is, but not getting warm air in the cabin suggests that coolant isn't getting to the heater matrix. The whole thing is a single system encompassing the engine, radiator and heater matrix, and the water pump is on the side of the engine driven by the cambelt.

It looks like the garage are automatically assuming pump failure, which seems unlikely but is a possibility - if it's not working, warm coolant will not get to the heater matrix so you'll only get cold air in the cabin.

There are a lot of diagnostic checks you could carry out yourself, but given that you've handed it over to a garage I'd imagine you're not too comfortable doing these yourself, so let us know what they come back with.

Fiat568 said:

Today a message warning appeared saying excessive radiator fluid. I assumed this was because the engine was too hot or overheating. Topped up water. But then realised heater inside car was blowing out cold air and not warm despite it being on warm setting.
I was wondering if there is a link to the warning light?
It only came on once and not appeared since.
I took the car to garage as precaution and the said something about a possible leak. They are running a diagnostic to find out and will get back to me regarding any work.
Has anyone else experienced cold or cool air blowing from heaters even though set on warm?
Also garage said of there is a leak that if work needs to be carried out it would also need the belt replaced which I did not expect.
Does anyone know if a belt would also need to be replaced as weLloyd as water leak sorted?
Is the heating water system linked to this belt?
Many thanks

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