Hey all,

So yesterday my Jimmy decided to try something new with me. I was driving to school at about 9am, and my defroster did not seem to work worth a damn at all first. So I was forced to wipe my windows manually, now the funny thing about this is that when my heater was on, i could smell coolant. Now Since it was cold that morning, I started noticing a mist coming out of my vents, not sure whether or not the defroster was on or not, but at that point I decided it was best to just head home. Anyone have any ideas?

Normally I would suspect head gasket, but it showed none of the usual signs, coolant and oil mixing, overheating, etc.

 

bad heater core.

 

This is a case of a leaking heatercore. the mist is vapors from the coolant,and chances are you are low on coolant. Nothing you can do but replace the core.

edit : coolasice beat me to it. lol

 

whew.. you guys saved me a ton of trouble. The shop i was gonna bring it to probably would have made me replace the HG.. lol. Anyone have an idea of cost of a new heatercore, and also point me in the right direction, as I do not yet have a service manual for this?

 

the core is about 40, but takes like 7 hours to replace

 

+1, huge PITA.

 

It is indeed terrible. and one of those parts id suggest to buy at the dealership. 7 hour job? Id want oem parts in that area. lol

 

its not a terrible thing to do,its just time consuming especially if you're not comfortable with tearing out the dash, one thing i would say is once you get the dash off and start removing the heater box, its way easier to cut the plastic around the two bottom studs rather than go at from the engine bay, but a lot of people don't like doing it that way

 

At this point i'm going to stuff socks or something into the front defroster vent and tape it shut, I dont so much mind the smell, but the fact that this **** fogs up my window to the point where I cant see in 60 degree weather is what is getting me mad. I just don't have the time to devote a whole weekend to replacing something this stupid lol.

 

instead just bypass the hoses under the hood... then you need not worry about it leaking into the interior of the vehicle....