Well I just bought my TTA yesterday and it only has 17,700 miles on it. Well when we went to pick it up the ugy said he had recently had the fluid flushed and we looked and there was coolant in the radiator but none in the tank. So we bought some and filled the tank up to the Hot Full line. Then we drove it like 300 miles home. When we got home the collant level was then at the cold full line. So today I drove it around and I let it warm up in the garage for baout 4 minutes before I drove it and the car has a leak right at the cat but there was fluid on the floor. My dad stuck his finger in it to smell it and said it was water. Well so I drove it for a good couple hours and when I got home my dad said he thinks I might have a blown head gasket (he's knows his cars pretty well and normally I agree with him). The car seems to idle a little rough bouncing around 700-900 rpm. I also had the car just shut off on me twice don't really know why but I would put it in park and it would start right up. If there is anyone who thinks they can help me it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Jared

 

A running engine produces water as part of its combustion by-products. So some water will almost always condense in a cold exhaust and drip out of wherever it leaks, during a cold startup.

I'd strongly recommend leaving heads and head gaskets alone until you know for sure that they're bad. They're probably not the cause of water leakage.

Start with simple stuff that goes bad when a car sits around for 15 years without being used. If it was mine, the first thing I'd be looking at, is the water pump. I'd almost bet money that's where coolant leaks, if it leaks coolant.

I also wouldn't worry about the idle. Things like that often tend to smooth out if the car gets used a little bit.

 

by "floor", do you mean interior floor of the car? Or floor of your garage?

If its the interior floor ABOVE the cat, then the culprit is a leaking heater core, which maybe is dripping through a hole in your floor pan (rusted through?) in the general location of the cat.
Just an idea


Matt

 

alright well someone one turbobuick.com said if it was producing white smoke it was probably the head gasket in which it was producing white smoke. However there are no other signs. The oil seems fine and the coolant in the radiator looks good. The only problems symptoms seem to be the magically disapearing coolant, the liquid (which doesn't smell like coolant at all) on the floor, and white smoke from the exhaust. The only thing of those that throws up a red flag for me is the missing coolant.

 

\/

 

Well we jsut got done doing a compression test and I think we had 3 cylinders at 155psi, 1 at 157, 1 at 150, and 1 at 148. So everything checked out and we had called the guy and then he let us know the overfill tank has a hole in the bottom of it. We looked and there's a decent amount of rust on the inner fender.

 

Good to see you got that taken care of

I'm willing to bet that a complete tuneup will take care of the slight idle issue too. Here's what I usually do after bringing home a new car: Plugs, wires, cap, rotor, fuel filter, o2, trans fluid and filter, and air filter. I'd also change at least the oil, and the antifreeze as well just to make sure it's done. People are known to become somewhat dishonest when trying to sell a car

Congrats on the purchase too, those TTA's are nice and hard to find.

 

The last owner had the radiator flushed, and we changed the oil at his house but couldn't get the filter off at the time so we said screw it we'll do it laster. We plan to replace the fuel pump, change the rear end fluid, replace the tranny fluid, and change the oil again but put in a new filter. I'm also looking and trying to find some like 8mm or 8.5mm wires for it. I'd rather have the bigger wires for when I start running a little more boost and I know they won't be the cause of any problems. Oh and the serpentine belt needs to be changed because it has the original one on and GM made it too big so the tensioner pulley I think it s hits something to do with the AC. So they shortened the pulley 16mm.