Cruze 1.4T water outlet leak

[sciphi]

The cooling system on this car has given me fits. Today's "cool" adventure was replacing the water outlet on the right side of the engine. This was leaking badly enough to leave small puddles under the car. My theory is that the gasket took a compression set and didn't rebound as it should. There also may have been a hairline crack that couldn't be located. Next time this happens, the gasket alone will be replaced instead of the whole unit. The gasket is $10 instead of the entire unit at $35 from the dealer.

For those of you keeping track at home, that makes a leaky water pump, leaking heater hose, possibly leaking radiator hose, and now a leaking water outlet gasket that have needed to be replaced in the past 2 months or so.

Pardon the dirty pictures, the old one was dug out of the kitty litter dumped under the car to sop up the spilled coolant.

Underside of outlet with leaking coolant traces:



Flattened gasket that is even with the edges in places:



More traces of coolant:



This took about 2 hours start to finish, including a 30 minute coffee break. A locking tension clamp tool was essential to getting off the larger tension clamps in awkward places. The radiator hose was left on until the outlet was removed from the block, since that clamp has a lot of tension and is in a very awkward position otherwise.

 

[53' Stude]

Sciphi: I dealt with one of those about 3 months ago. Ended up sending it to the dealer since the coolant temperature sender wouldn't show true temperature and it was slowly overheating. Apparently another shop looked at it and did a half a** job on it. Head gasket and what you show was the problem


Thank you for sharing sir

 

[MONKEYMAN]

What are those deposits on the inside of the water pump?

 

[OVERKILL]

Dude... MORE cooling system issues????!!

wow!

 

[wymi516]

That's a lot of leaks, have these issues been resolved on the new 1.4's?

 

[KGMtech]

Originally Posted By: MONKEYMAN
What are those deposits on the inside of the water pump?


OP said he dumped the old part in kitty litter...so the photos have that stuff stuck to all the wet surfaces of the part. Yuck!

 

[Chris142]

I don't know what's up with those cars and their cooling systems. I sure see a lot plus blown hoses at very low milages

 

[eljefino]

They run a pretty high PSI cap due to "coolant smell" and probably to prevent cavitation/ hot spots. Seems pretty band-aid-y to me.

 

[NHGUY]

4 years is probably max life for a Cruze.

 

[Chris142]

Originally Posted By: NHGUY
4 years is probably max life for a Cruze.
no comment lol

 

[pbm]

As I've stated before, I traded in my Cruze because of coolant smell/ loss issues.
There were several threads on the Cruzetalk forum (with hundreds of pages) of owners complaining and GM wouldn't acknowledge a problem.

What I found really frustrating was the variety (and number) of possibilities....water pump, heater core, t-stat, glycol lube in the heater blend door, surge tank, surge tank o-ring, surge tank cap etc..etc..etc..

It seemed that GM was trying to wait owners out until their warranty was up because the whole system was terrible.

 

[bullwinkle]

What coolant is used in those? That doesn't look like DexCool residue at all!

 

[sciphi]

Originally Posted By: bullwinkle
What coolant is used in those? That doesn't look like DexCool residue at all!


Current formula Dex-Cool. And kitty litter residue.

Some of the cooling issues that this car has had could likely have been the result of some of the hack-job water pump replacements done and re-done under warranty.

Also, this particular engine being an Opel design with lots of German-made parts being heat-cycled for 130k miles likely doesn't help matters.

Either way, I'm not shocked at the cooling system issues this car has had. Dismayed, yes. Shocked, no.

 

[stephen9666]

Yes, cooling system problems are common and not fun on this car.

Also, most people would call this the "left" side of the engine. You generally refer to "left" or "right" on a car as if you were sitting in the driver's seat.

So far I've have my coolant flange and an associated coolant hose replaced. I also get the coolant smell from the venting reservoir that others complain about. I replaced the o-ring on the cap and that has reduced, but not totally eliminated the issue.

 

[mcgophers]

Well shoot, I'm looking into buying a Cruze and this is not what I want to see. Cooling problems nearly killed my last GM car before I got gifted the Hyundai I'm in now.

 

[sciphi]

Originally Posted By: mcgophers
Well shoot, I'm looking into buying a Cruze and this is not what I want to see. Cooling problems nearly killed my last GM car before I got gifted the Hyundai I'm in now.


What year? The 2011-2016's have the Opel-derived 1.4T. The 2017's have a completely new 1.4T.

Also, I suspect that at least some of the issues on my particular car are from a series of shoddy warranty repairs, and not a design flaw. Although gosh knows that the LUJ 1.4T's cooling system has enough of those from the factory. Those issues got sorted out as the model years went on. The part I installed was the latest revision part that GM's putting on the Cruze Limited rolling off the line now. If you're comfortable doing brakes, this isn't much harder. It does need some sort of specialty tools like hose clamp pliers and E-Torx sockets.

I have a soft spot for that generation Elantra, though. Those were solid cars. Although they did have their downsides.

 

[zzyzzx]

I assume that leaking part is plastic? If so, is there a metal replacement part available?

 

[dailydriver]

Originally Posted By: sciphi
The 2017's have a completely new 1.4T.


These are an aluminum block for the first time, and also direct injected, correct?

 

[mcgophers]

Originally Posted By: sciphi
Originally Posted By: mcgophers
Well shoot, I'm looking into buying a Cruze and this is not what I want to see. Cooling problems nearly killed my last GM car before I got gifted the Hyundai I'm in now.


What year? The 2011-2016's have the Opel-derived 1.4T. The 2017's have a completely new 1.4T.

Also, I suspect that at least some of the issues on my particular car are from a series of shoddy warranty repairs, and not a design flaw. Although gosh knows that the LUJ 1.4T's cooling system has enough of those from the factory. Those issues got sorted out as the model years went on. The part I installed was the latest revision part that GM's putting on the Cruze Limited rolling off the line now. If you're comfortable doing brakes, this isn't much harder. It does need some sort of specialty tools like hose clamp pliers and E-Torx sockets.

I have a soft spot for that generation Elantra, though. Those were solid cars. Although they did have their downsides.


I'm looking at a 2013-16 Cruze at this time if I go that route. The 17s are just out of my price range, and admittedly I'm more interested in the hatch version of the 17 whenever that comes out.

Mine is very solid, as much as I hated it when I first got it. I finally had a breakdown last week for the first time in the 2 years I've owned it with driving an insane amount. I just wish it had AC.

 

[sciphi]

Originally Posted By: zzyzzx
I assume that leaking part is plastic? If so, is there a metal replacement part available?


Not yet. It's a fairly detailed piece that's easier to make in nylon than metal. And, most of my issue was a gasket failure. Although different expansion rates could have caused the failure.

Originally Posted By: dailydriver
Originally Posted By: sciphi
The 2017's have a completely new 1.4T.


These are an aluminum block for the first time, and also direct injected, correct?


Yes. Also a significant bump in power, to 160ish.