Just want to vent...

[cdsmith]

Howdy...

Weather is getting nice here in Northern CA... so.... took the little car out for a spin on Sunday... When I got back home I decided to chech under the hood (bonnet) an noticed the "stupid" valve for the heater leaking (again) - seems that the leak is at the mounting plate - it has done this in the past (out comes the silicone RTV...).

Started looking around a little more and discovered a little coolant dripping out of the heater core - I guess I'll be driving w/o a heater for a while (bypass the core)... Getting warm outside anyway...

I guess I might spend some time and remove the heater parts and do a little "cleaning" and "make pretty"...

cd

 

[JPSmit]

"I guess I might as well..." hehehe don't do it you'll be stripping the whole car don't ask me how I know. Seriously, be glad you caught it before anything ran dry.

 

[bgbassplyr]

You might try:

STOP LEAK.

Available everywhere. Has always worked for me on small leaks.

Jim

 

[tony barnhill]

Heater valve needs cleaning/rebuilding or replacing...& its so easy...better to do that than to fiddle around with 'bandaids'...it isn't a stop leak problem; it isn't an RTV problem....I mean, if you're gonna take it off anyway to put RTV under it, you might as well try this: [url="https://www.theautoist.com/cl...theautoist.com/cleaning_heater_valves.htm/url)

Oh, & stopped up heater valve can cause pressure on a weak heater core & cause it to leak.

 

[Midget78]

I had a problem with the heater valve on my midget and I agree with Tony. Very easy to fix. The only issue I had was I had to carefully apply heat to my bolts as they were rusted and wouldnt break loose. Once I got them off the rebuild was a walk in the park. I got my kit from Moss and it came with a new chrome mounting plate to pretty things up.

 

[cdsmith]

I've had the heater valve off a couple of times...

The valve itself does not leak - the valve initially leaked where it screwed into the mounting plate - I seem to have fixed that. Now it seems to be leaking at the base of the plate itself... I guess I'll just make another gasket and give it a shot! Not too worried - gives me something to do...

The heater core is going to be removed and (maybe) at some point in the future I'll have it fixed (if I can't do it my self).

I'm not much of a "stop leak" person... At least for this car - everything is pretty easy to get to and fix...

Now.. on my "new to me" Xterra - that may have a leak in the heater core. It seems to get to the heater core it will require the removal of the dash and a bunch of other stuff to the tune of something like $600 or more, then "stop leak" may be a choice!

Technology (or the lack thereof) really makes me like this car!

Thanks for the input.
cd

 

[ncbugeye]

Tony, I got a 404 on the link to your article. I think you have the url tag terminated incorrectly.

 

[tony barnhill]

You're right - sorry...here's the link for cleaning an MGB valve (Midget is a little different & actually easier to rebuild/clean): https://www.theautoist.com/cleaning_heater_valves.htm

cd: I only know 1 way to say this & I apologize if it comes out wrong; however, you're wasting your time with your bandaid fix & all it is going to do is frustrate you when it starts leaking again.

Since you know how to remove the bad valve from the head, toss it & install a new one - it is just as easy as reinstalling the old one.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:]The valve itself does not leak[/QUOTE] It could very possibly be pushing water out if it is stopped up...& the only place the water can go is out the base once the gasket is soaked. There's a reason it repeatedly leaks in the same area & continuing to renew gaskets isn't doing anything except prolonging the necessary repair.

 

[cdsmith]

It didn't come out wrong... Well thought out information is always helpful.

It makes sense that if the valve was clogged up the coolant would have to go someplace else!

Thanks.
cd