Smell of coolant while running the heater

Dec 10, 2003 3 Replies
L

Greetings,



I have 96 Maxima, and the check engine light is on, the garage I took it too put it on the scope which told him the O2 sensor and knock sensor were the problem. These were replaced but two days later the check engine came back on. Then I noticed the smell of coolant once or twice with the heater running. The car runs fine, but should I be concerned about this smell? Could there be a leak in the cooling system... it doesn't overheat, and the heater works great.



Thanks,



Laura Ottawa, Canada


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D

Thats a bad sign of a leaking heater core. When running the defroster the window fogs? If so better get it replaced. dk

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C

I noticed a similar thing on my '97 Maxima, and it turned out to be a leak in the radiator. Perhaps put a piece of cardboard under the car when you park it, or keep track of your coolant levels under the hood...

- Chris Merkel

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S

On "fresh", the system can pull in fumes from under the hood/outside the car so it could be anywhere. It -could- be a heater core which is bad news :-(

I'd take it back to the shop and see why the check engine light is still on.

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