Hello, I have a coolant leak.

Background: Just bought a beauty, 87' XJ6, I'm happy to join the Jaguar brotherhood. Yesterday the low coolant light flashes on, after a brief "oh no" moment I calm and drive to the nearest auto parts store to take a look -- the car had not overheated. Coolant was quite low, I noticed coolant was slowly pooling almost directly under the brown plastic coolant tank but couldn't see a drip.

Unfortunately, I was in a hurry that couldn't wait (girlfriend's uncle's wedding rehearsal), so I refilled the coolant and drove about 200 highway miles, I was nervous that I was making a seriously stupid mistake, but she rode like a champ, no issues, I'm lucky.

I got home late, quite dark, so I didn't have energy or ability to trace the leak.

This morning I went out to find another small pool in the same spot, almost directly under the brown plastic tank, but couldn't find an obvious cause for the leak. The coolant was down again, about a quart and a half to bring the tank back up to the neck.

I'm going to take her into the shop this week, but I'm hoping somebody would be generous enough to take a good guess at what I'm looking at -- I'm young and not yet mechanically inclined (looking forward to learning).

Thank you very much.

Matt Lowe

Should I fire her up and look for the leak? probably? Thanks again.

 

Coolant leaks can be difficult, especially around a hot engine. The large national chains of auto parts stores loan, or sell with full refund, pressure testing kits that make it easy.

Could be the tank itself, a hose or somewhere else. No perfect guess available via the www.

Welcome to the forum!