Good evening everyone! i just bought my subaru impreza yesterday and i have started getting problems already.
Basically i bought the car knowing a few bits needed doing brakes, alternator (supplied with sale) and a split in the rad hose (also supplied with sale). i travelled all the way up to manchester from st albans, hertfordshire. i gave the car a thorough going over and everything seem to be spot on
however when i got into St Albans from purchasing the car, i could start to smell coolant, so i stopped filled the car with water and got it home.
This morning i decided to change the rad hose and it was indeed spilt more so than it was yesterday, i changed it over and that seemed to take care of the leak. However now the car seems to be overheating and the heaters dont seem to be functioning. The car was working fine prior to this and was not overheating. I am thinking the headgasket is on its way out? but im not an expert. Has anyone else seen this before? also the radiator was changed recently.

Many thanks Michael

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I'm no expert but I've heard people on here with same problem and it could be
an air lock. Squeeze the pipes as you put water in so it works all around the system, worth a try I suppose

 

I think you will find it's headgasket, very common and first sign is split top hose, it will also push the water out of the header tank or burst the side of the rad, seen it loads of times.

 

I think this is a bit misleading!


What proceedure did you use to fill it with coolent? Try taking the header tank cap off and let the car idle to temperature (or when rad fan kicks in). You should see bubble rising to the top.....you can also give the hoses a squeeze to try and get the air lock out (if it is indeed an air lock). Top up the coolent as the air has not been displaced.

 

jesus, thats a big assumption. the scaremongers are still on here!

My imprezas have both spilt hoses and one split a rad but it hasnt been head gasket. the hoses and rad get brittle and split with age.

the op needs to drain the system down and refill slowley to rid air from the system.
check the simple things first, dont just assume head gasket.

 

thank you for all the responses, im going to try and bleed the system first. does that usually cause the car to overheat then?
i done a sniffer test on it and it came out green, tbh i dont really trust the test. As it came out a strong yellow (positive) on my old ep82 and it was infact my waterpump that was at fault

 

My pug lost all her water when the heater matrix went, and the head gasket didnt go (and i was only 400 yards from the garage which helped ).
The chances are, you have an air lock in your system, it needs bleeding and re filling, and if you have any knackered part of the cooling system, you need to get it sorted asap or you will have a head gasket problem, and thats £800+ to fix

Tony

 

Sorry guys, not trying to scare monger, get it bled and see what happens, the fact that it has had a rad and now the top hose has split would indicate high water pressure, may not be and I hope it isn't, but if it drove from Manchester to StAlbans ok, I doubt it had an airlock (that would of shown up within a few miles).