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Coolant loss 997

Porscheyank

Member
Joined
16 Oct 2018
Messages
5
Hi All
Desperate for some help. Recently purchased a 997.1 and has been checked for bore score issue before I purchased. Soon after I had a cool and warning light come on an my tank was about a cm below the min. Took the car to my local INDY And they found a few pipes etc leaky so had all them done. Great, then two miles down the road same light came on so took back to INDY for further inspection. Today they have called me to say they are not sure as to why it's loosing the coolant as there are no signs of milky oil / head gasket gone and the pressure tests are not showing anything.
Car has done 77k with full history

ANY IDEAS??
 
Porscheyank said:
Hi All
Desperate for some help. Recently purchased a 997.1 and has been checked for bore score issue before I purchased. Soon after I had a cool and warning light come on an my tank was about a cm below the min. Took the car to my local INDY And they found a few pipes etc leaky so had all them done. Great, then two miles down the road same light came on so took back to INDY for further inspection. Today they have called me to say they are not sure as to why it's loosing the coolant as there are no signs of milky oil / head gasket gone and the pressure tests are not showing anything.
Car has done 77k with full history

ANY IDEAS??

Make sure they have checked the usual suspects including coolant cap (it often lets go) and cracks in the coolant tank...and possibly the front radiators and connections. I guess they have checked all that and the pressure test should have shown up any issues.
 
Took me about 4 years to work out the coolant loss was due to a cracked coolant tank.

An indie said the coolant loss was normal, nothing wrong with it, and charged me £60 to inspect the system - I even asked if it could be the coolant tank, and was told "no, they don't leak on a 997". This was from an indie that some people speak highly of on here.

Another changed my water pump for £385 plus cost of pump, and it was still leaking after.

Trust no one!

If the work has never been done before, and given your mileage, if I were in your shoes, I would have the coolant tank replaced, and at the same time your water pump (Pierburg one) and thermostat changed - to rule it all out. Just my opinion, ofcourse.
 
As has already been mentioned, expansion tank cap or tank itself are likely culprits if pipes, water pump and rads are ok.
They typically leak when hot and under pressure.

The other option is they've fixed the leak and this is simply an airlock.
But they should have told you and minimised that possibility.
Can you see where its leaking from?
 
Take it to a different indy or consider an OPC (the age of your car will qualify for the Modern Classics labour rate which compares to indy labour rates anyway).
 
Ok ill take a step back here ..

Your coolant lvl was 1 cm too low so about half a pint or less down ..

About 0.4 of a ltr ?

Thats not enough to trigger a coolant warning fault due to low lvl .. closer to 1.5 ltrs would be .

So its not a fault with coolant loss its an electrical fault .. i would start with checking the lvl sensor system .

If your talking temp gauge dropping to zero and back up then i would start with the temp sensor system .

As you have just bought the car then im guessing this has been a problem for a while .. hard to find elecdtrical faults often are .

garage are saying its still looseing coolant ? or are they saying the light is still on .. big difference there !

More info please young man :)
 
Hi all thanks for all the replies today I've booked into my local Porsche Centre for them to check over I will report back to you as soon as they have looked at and go from there I have already change the expansion tank but I didn't do the water pump unfortunately at the same time
 
Ref your PM ..

If your car is a Tiptronic then this electric switch over valve may well be faulty .. you need to get it checked.
 

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This fault kinda switched to PM so ill do a recap for future ref .

The actual fault ..

Car is normal for about 10 miles at which point the temp gauge drops to zero and the red light starts flashing .

This Fault is ONLY applicable to Tiptronic boxes .

The electric valve opens the coolant to circulate through a cooler .. its to cool the tip oil basically .

When the valve fails it defaults to open .. the coolant basically has an extra rad to cool it so the engine temp remains low .

The car after a while sees that the engine oil is hotter than the coolant .. which it shouldnt be .. it thinks there is a problem with the coolant sensor so drops into default mode which is 66 degrees , temp gauge inop and light flashing to warn the driver trhere is a fault .

This will usually reset the following day to give the same symptoms again.

The fault is the electric switch valve for this and NOT the diaphram unit .. its a cheap fix .

Garages often associate this with coolant loss .. there may well be a leak but you need to have an empty coolant bottle to get something similar .. if you dont have this but do have this fault then change this valve .. its only peanuts after all so worth eliminateing .
 
deMort said:
This fault kinda switched to PM so ill do a recap for future ref .

The actual fault ..

Car is normal for about 10 miles at which point the temp gauge drops to zero and the red light starts flashing .

This Fault is ONLY applicable to Tiptronic boxes .

The electric valve opens the coolant to circulate through a cooler .. its to cool the tip oil basically .

When the valve fails it defaults to open .. the coolant basically has an extra rad to cool it so the engine temp remains low .

The car after a while sees that the engine oil is hotter than the coolant .. which it shouldnt be .. it thinks there is a problem with the coolant sensor so drops into default mode which is 66 degrees , temp gauge inop and light flashing to warn the driver trhere is a fault .

This will usually reset the following day to give the same symptoms again.

The fault is the electric switch valve for this and NOT the diaphram unit .. its a cheap fix .

Garages often associate this with coolant loss .. there may well be a leak but you need to have an empty coolant bottle to get something similar .. if you dont have this but do have this fault then change this valve .. its only peanuts after all so worth eliminateing .
997 GT3 has the same system and sometimes the same fault.
My car did it :thumb:
 

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