plastic tank radiator issues is this a tank seal gone bad?

My 97 camaro has had a intermittent leak for sometime and lost all it's coolant again today. This isn't a steady thing it happens every so often where when shut off it drips under the front of the car.

I took radiator out today, and it has the signs of leakage all over the passenger side tank from top to bottom and front to back. I see no crack and thought it could have been leaking from the cap possibly.

However I stuck my finger inside the radiator cap hole and felt a rubber piece felt round but could have been square right by where the tank joins the core. Is this rubber piece the tank seal or something else? It isn't just a piece of rubber stuck in there it feels like it might have slipped into the tank cause it feels like there is a small gap there.

anyone have a picture of one of these seals or heard of one section separating and dangling in the tank?

I would rather avoid spending money to have a radiator shop look at it and charge me and just buy a new radiator if this is really what this rubber piece is and that has been where this leak has been over the last year.

Also wouldn't this rubber seal fit in a groove around the tank or could this tank have cracked internally and that is why this piece of rubber is hanging there?

I have a similar rad in my '72 vette, I bet, single row aluminum about 1.25 thick and black plastic tanks on it, and I have been told to just replace it when the tank seals go, not fixable.....my rad was for a later Camaro 350, happens to fit the stock mounts just fine.....been in there for maybe 8 years now, the previous one was installed in '95 when I got the car....it started leaking....found one here in Jax for like 185 bux, God help you today on that price....

I found a hairline crack in the passenger tank about 8" long and when you put pressure on it it does open. So that was probably the mysterious leak as pressure built in my cooling system it opened the crack. I check autozone and they want 129.00 for one. But have seen them on ebay for as low as 99.00. It is the original radiator so it did good.

I see this radiator ranging from 90-130 but different company names such as silla, spectra, delphi, vista.

I would think delphi would have been the original maker but are the others equally as good?

Not interested in a aluminum after-market radiator since this car never has cooling problems even in the hottest of temps.

JeffP1167 said:

I see this radiator ranging from 90-130 but different company names such as silla, spectra, delphi, vista.

I would think delphi would have been the original maker but are the others equally as good?

Not interested in a aluminum after-market radiator since this car never has cooling problems even in the hottest of temps.

Click to expand...

Shit, some guys don't need a gun.....:crap::bomb:

mrvette said:

JeffP1167 said:

I see this radiator ranging from 90-130 but different company names such as silla, spectra, delphi, vista.

I would think delphi would have been the original maker but are the others equally as good?

Not interested in a aluminum after-market radiator since this car never has cooling problems even in the hottest of temps.

Click to expand...

Shit, some guys don't need a gun.....:crap::bomb:

Click to expand...

see owning a V-6 has it's benefits

JeffP1167 said:

mrvette said:

JeffP1167 said:

I see this radiator ranging from 90-130 but different company names such as silla, spectra, delphi, vista.

I would think delphi would have been the original maker but are the others equally as good?

Not interested in a aluminum after-market radiator since this car never has cooling problems even in the hottest of temps.

Click to expand...

Shit, some guys don't need a gun.....:crap::bomb:

Click to expand...

see owning a V-6 has it's benefits

Click to expand...

OH, maybe not the same radiator then....ok, now I feel slightly better.....:clap:

mrvette said:

JeffP1167 said:

mrvette said:

JeffP1167 said:

I see this radiator ranging from 90-130 but different company names such as silla, spectra, delphi, vista.

I would think delphi would have been the original maker but are the others equally as good?

Not interested in a aluminum after-market radiator since this car never has cooling problems even in the hottest of temps.

Click to expand...

Shit, some guys don't need a gun.....:crap::bomb:

Click to expand...

see owning a V-6 has it's benefits

Click to expand...

OH, maybe not the same radiator then....ok, now I feel slightly better.....:clap:

Click to expand...

I will give the cheapest one a shot and let you all know the outcome

OH GOOD LORD STOP, DON'T DO IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!










nevermind, those radiators are fine, carry on

Well didn't feel like driving 60 miles to save 40 bucks and drove down the street to autozone and surprisingly enough they had a radiator in stock made by spectra with lifetime warranty for 129.00. Matches my original perfectly and seems to be nicely made .... I will let you all know if the cheapo one lasts :crutches: Probably was the best route since I had rusty colored coolant and with garden hose in old radiator it didn't seem to flow that great, so the car should run nice and cool again. While it never overheated in 100 degree weather with a/c on blizzard I could tell it didn't cool as quickly as it used to and would start climbing to 220 a lot.

I flushed the entire engine and recovery tank out last night till only clear water came out and bought the yellow prestone extended life coolant (not dexcool crap) I have this yellow coolant in my windstar and it has never done what that dexcool did to my cooling system.

I had a friend's '94 Chebby conversion van here, V8, with dual HVAC the works....and the rad water was as brown as the river near by.....swamp type brown moving at 0 mph flow, you can imagine a Florida swamp.....

I must have flushed that thing for over an hour the first time, and gave up, then went back and did it again, never ever really got clean, so tossed in the full dose green shit, and called it a day......I don't think that van ever had anything done to it since new, even the cap was rusted to the point I had a tough time getting it off the rad.....

:surrender::amazed::cussing:

mrvette said:

I had a friend's '94 Chebby conversion van here, V8, with dual HVAC the works....and the rad water was as brown as the river near by.....swamp type brown moving at 0 mph flow, you can imagine a Florida swamp.....

I must have flushed that thing for over an hour the first time, and gave up, then went back and did it again, never ever really got clean, so tossed in the full dose green shit, and called it a day......I don't think that van ever had anything done to it since new, even the cap was rusted to the point I had a tough time getting it off the rad.....

:surrender::amazed::cussing:

Click to expand...

Sounds like my camaro .. original down to even the radiator hoses. Gotta say though it went 148k miles with 2 tuneups, 2 alternators, 1 new set of plug wires, few belts, 1 belt tensioner and a few oil changes.

The 3.8 series 2 is a great engine.

here is the new radiator. Seems like just as nice as my original delphi but much cleaner :bounce:





old one



One difference I noticed is how the core is braced. On the delphi in this area the thin metal strip goes into the core where the coolant tubes go. On this radiator it uses thicker metal and loops over the top of the core. Actually seems like a more sturdier radiator then my original.





old ones brace





You can kinda see the cracked tank here but I am sure it was leaking from that seal as well if that is what it was.

INteresting in that the right side tank LOOKS identical to mine, but the left side is different from what I can see.....

rest of the core looks the same, even the proportion, so I ASSume the core is the same.....

:lol:

well let my car idle for about 40 minutes and it does cool down a lot quicker when the fans come on and at idle with a/c on blizzard at 95 degrees car stays right about 185 degrees.

No leaks have been seem as of yet and coolant is staying green. I'm going to drive it for a week and flush the system again to make sure all that brown nasty coolant is gone.

JeffP1167 said:

Well didn't feel like driving 60 miles to save 40 bucks and drove down the street to autozone and surprisingly enough they had a radiator in stock made by spectra with lifetime warranty for 129.00. Matches my original perfectly and seems to be nicely made .... I will let you all know if the cheapo one lasts :crutches: Probably was the best route since I had rusty colored coolant and with garden hose in old radiator it didn't seem to flow that great, so the car should run nice and cool again. While it never overheated in 100 degree weather with a/c on blizzard I could tell it didn't cool as quickly as it used to and would start climbing to 220 a lot.

I flushed the entire engine and recovery tank out last night till only clear water came out and bought the yellow prestone extended life coolant (not dexcool crap) I have this yellow coolant in my windstar and it has never done what that dexcool did to my cooling system.

Click to expand...

I've been using them for late model vehicles and they are fine and the prices are right.

I wouldn't suggest flushing the cooling system with the new rad connected, if need be put the old one back in for that. The core tubes in the alum rads are a lot smaller and can sometimes plug with crap even when brand new.

You can use some organic acids to clean the engine system, but you have to use the block drains too. Oxalic acid (wood bleach), phosphoric acid (OSPHO) and others will work, but flush afterwards with Washing Soda to neutralize.

010752 said:

JeffP1167 said:

Well didn't feel like driving 60 miles to save 40 bucks and drove down the street to autozone and surprisingly enough they had a radiator in stock made by spectra with lifetime warranty for 129.00. Matches my original perfectly and seems to be nicely made .... I will let you all know if the cheapo one lasts :crutches: Probably was the best route since I had rusty colored coolant and with garden hose in old radiator it didn't seem to flow that great, so the car should run nice and cool again. While it never overheated in 100 degree weather with a/c on blizzard I could tell it didn't cool as quickly as it used to and would start climbing to 220 a lot.

I flushed the entire engine and recovery tank out last night till only clear water came out and bought the yellow prestone extended life coolant (not dexcool crap) I have this yellow coolant in my windstar and it has never done what that dexcool did to my cooling system.

Click to expand...

I've been using them for late model vehicles and they are fine and the prices are right.

I wouldn't suggest flushing the cooling system with the new rad connected, if need be put the old one back in for that. The core tubes in the alum rads are a lot smaller and can sometimes plug with crap even when brand new.

You can use some organic acids to clean the engine system, but you have to use the block drains too. Oxalic acid (wood bleach), phosphoric acid (OSPHO) and others will work, but flush afterwards with Washing Soda to neutralize.

Click to expand...

That isn't how I flushed my system. I removed old radiator and then took thermostat out and reinstalled thermostat cover, then stuck garden hose in thermostat housing and let it flush for a good 15-30 minutes. Then removed my coolant recovery tank and flushed it. Put new radiator back in and thermostat the filled radiator with 50/50 mix green stuff and opened the bleed hole and while doing this a lot of clear water came out before green coolant start to come out the bleed hole. Once coolant was consistent to what I was pouring in I stopped.

Refilled the recovery tank and burped the system like 3 times and drove the car about 100 miles and opened cap this morning and my coolant is nice and green.

The car cools like when it was new now, the fans don't run a lot anymore and now takes long time of stop and go to get it to go from 190 to 210 and when it does get to 210 the fans bring the temp down fast. Also noticed I don't get super hot temps from my foot wells.

I used to wonder why I had muddy drops all all over my rear bumper and passenger side of my car. My G/F commented on that once and I told her I probably went through a puddle.

all in all I'm happy with the cheapo radiator and it's performance. My a/c also blows much colder because my a/c condenser was caked with the muddy stuff leaking from the radiator. I just bought 6 cans of brake cleaner and and sprayed the condenser down.

One thing I noticed different about radiator is this. My original one just under the cap has the recovery tank port. However the replacement radiator has an extra port just like the recovery tank port. It had a rubber car and hose clamp on it but I didn't see a hole in the radiator for it so I removed the cap thinking it was a dummy port. It immediately started leaking coolant there so what is this port for?

I have heard the LT1 cars had a low coolant light, any of you have a LT1 picture of this area? I'm wondering if wiring is present on my car to add this to my car.

I've put about 350 miles on the car since this and coolant is still green so I guess I got lucky and got all the muddy coolant out.