I am a shade tree mechanic at best. Recently my wifes 02 SS quit having heat and was losing coolant. I told her to take it to a local shop we have used for a long time. They replaced the thermostat and said it needed a new water pump and the plastic elbow connectors.

That was all replaced there was still no heat, they did a pressure test and said the head gaskets were blown. I get the car back home and start looking it over, I find that there is no water in the oil, no sweet smell from anywhere or white smoke, and no bubbles in the radiator. My wife drove it around put maybe 100 miles on it and no loss of coolant (or if any minimal). I did discover that the upper radiator hose appeared to be partially collapsed and was leaking some at the bleeder screw. Replaced hose, tighten bleeder screw still no heat.

At 70 degrees ambient temp the car with heat on high is still blowing cold air.

Heater hoses are heating up, I purged all air out of the system. I am finding zero coolant leaks now and the coolant levels are not going down. Everything in me says I do not have a cooling system problem, but something else.

Thoughts?

 

Well if a compression test says the head gasket(s) are bad, that could cause it, as could a failing heater core.

 

They said they did a coolant pressure test not a compression test. Please correct me if I am wrong, wouldn't the leak at the bleeder valve also show no pressure in the cooling system?

Heater core besides the obvious leaking inside the cabinet (which it isn't at least not right now) how else can it be tested if at all?

Also is there any way that this could be a blend door actuator or heater control valve? I am trying to figure out all possibilities then work my way down in testing.

Thank you for your input.

 

Most of the time when head gaskets are blown it comes from overheating the engine, this happen to me once. I think you may have something with the blend door actuator or heater control valve. Or the Thermostat might be bad too, even though it is new. And maybe the technician is not getting it?

 

Id check to make sure the blend door motor was working. It may be kaput and stuck in cold mode if you are lucky

 

With dual climate control would there be two blend door motors one for each side? If so I can probably rule that out as the problem is present on both sides. I was just thinking of that. I am leaning currently towards clogged heater core, inlet hose gets nice and hot outlet hardly any heat at all. Will flush heater core (at least see if have time) next week.

 

When you flush the heater core take both hose's off of it and flush both direction's (back flush) . It's pretty easy to do and removes a lot more sludge than a regular flush. I rig up a flush tee , cap one end and put a hose on the other or just take a 3/4 inch hoes and fit it over the hose nozzle and the other end to the heater core and flush both ways. As for the collapsed hose that could be as simple as a radiator cap. If you do a pressure test starting at 10-12 psi and the cooling system builds pressure while it is running you have a issue, If it holds and don't leak you don't. Can usually rent or borrow them from a parts store. Good luck.