First off I'm not mechanic. That being said I have a 2002 monte carlo ss. The car is leaking anti freeze from multiple places. The mechanic said its leaking from the water pump. Radiator and some where on the engine. He didnt want to mess with it. Pretty much said I need a new engine. The car doesnt have anti freeze in the oil. I've put a bottle of k seal in it and 6 tablets of bars stop leak. The leak has Definitely slowed down but it's still spitting anti freeze. My question is would it be smart to run it with the radiotor cap half turned? To relieve some pressure? I pretty much just need it to last long enough to get me back and forth to work intill I can afford another car. Its winter here also. Its not over heating but idk how much i should trust the temp gauge either. Pretty much just looking for any tips or tricks or products and any opinions you guys might have to help me out. Pretty much at the point where I'm just going to run it till it dies obviously the longer the better. I'm very low on money and dont have many options at this point. Just need it to last as long as possible. It does run strong and the oil is clean. Anything you guys can tell me would be much appreciated. Thank you..

 

This could be as simple as a bad Hose, try to squeeze the hose and see if its real soft a sqweshey, if so you may need a new hose. If the Water pump is leaking that will need to be replaced. But if it is leaking at a hose connection that maybe needs a new hose or tighten up the clamp on it. I have not used the stop leak stuff they seem to cause issues if they aren't done properly. If you run the radiator cap half open some times it will heat up and leak out. What kind of condition is the car in? Miles ? engine area clean or dirty?

 

It has 169.000 miles I bought it for 1000 dollars. Engine is clean besides the recent anti freeze rain all over the passenger side of the engine. And yeah the hoses are pretty soft.

 

Well that doesn't look to bad. So what you may want to do is Change the Radiator hoses there are 2 the Bigger 2inch size. You could have a Garage do it or your self. One thing you can do to get some experience on these cars is to Find a Salvage yard the lets you do the part removal around here it's a U Pull it yard. They could have as many as 5 to 10 cars with that engine in it. find the best hose and liberate it. now you know how to work on the car and you didn't goof yours up doing it. Take it home and replace the part in your car. Just a thought!

 

Most likely elbows that are above the water pump. They come factory in a hard plastic and get brittle over time. They can be changed out fora metal style (not a hard job). If you are not mechanically inclined I would definitely take it to a different mechanic. Even the water pump is not a hard job if needed. I hope you get things figured out.

 

I concur with supercharged, check the coolant elbows right there in front of the altenater,the plastic ones crack and leak replace with the metal aluminum ones, mine did this and took me forever to find the leak !! not too hard to do also the water pump, hoses and radiator itself

 

I also agree with supercharged except I didn't have luck with the metal elbows (never fully sealed due to insufficient o-ring diameter) and had to replace again because of a much smaller amount of leakage. I used AC Delco parts the second time around with success.