Coolant reservoir low or empty, leaking out from cap?

[Tom Yancy]

I noticed my car has been leaking and/or spraying antifreeze out of the reservoir, seems this is a common problem. You can see where it had leaked on top of the reservoir and there is some coolant in my battery tray. The reservoir looks to be empty or nearly empty, can't really tell because I didn't remove the cap and look. The car does not run hot according to the gauge, nor does it seem abnormally hot under the hood, around the radiator, or hoses. Should I get a new cap and top off the reservoir or is it not that simple? If I only replace the cap and fill the reservoir, will I still need to burp the system? Do you have to burp the system if you pull the crossover plug and top off the coolant? Should I just take it to the dealer and have the cooling system flushed and burped while I'm at it? At a glance, it looked like the coolant in my battery tray was green, will it hurt to run the green coolant in these cars?

[DSG2003Mach1]

i would try a new cap

if theres still coolant in the res or in that hose the hooks to the bottom of it, just top it off and you should be fine.

just because you open the fill plug on the crossover doesnt mean it needs to be burped, however if you have to add coolant from there Id bring it up to temp then check the level at the crossover again once its cooled.

most coolant bottles now will say that theyre ok to mix with any color antifreeze, so just check the label

[Tom Yancy]

Thanks!

[Tom Yancy]

PO told me the car lot just put new fans on it, and they had the cooling out while doing it. It appears they just didn't get it full. I guess over the course of the past week I used about a gallon of 50/50 antifreeze topping it off, but it hasn't needed any since Friday, knock on wood. As for leaking from under the cap, I bought a new cap, but it still did it. I took it back and put the old cap back on, tightening the heck out of it. I haven't seen any more coolant coming out from under the cap in several days either.

[DSG2003Mach1]

sounds like they did a shitty job burping it, glad it didnt over heat on you.

I was organizing the paperwork from my car and found where they ended up having to replace the coolant tank to get mine to stop leaking, had forgotten all about that.

[Tom Yancy]

I was going to do the burping procedure Saturday, but it was still full of coolant so I left it alone. Next thing would have been to replace the reservior, which I might still do just for cosmetic reasons, with an aluminum one from Moroso or Canton. It did get "warm" once in a drive thru, but I turned the heat on full blast and left, it cooled back down immediately. I topped it off the next morning and it has never gone over the half way mark since, and it was barely over half way then. I will be very pleased if this is all that needed to be done.