I like to be detailed with my descriptions so sorry if this gets a bit long.
History: About 40K miles ago I was having a cooling issue that I determined to be a faulty thermostat. I replaced it along with the timing belt and water pump. Sometime around that same point I replaced the coolant tank because of a small crack in the bottom of it. About 6K miles ago I noticed the coolant tank was at the minimum mark. I topped it off with G12 and it seemed to be fine. A short while after this I had one of the coolant lines to the oil filter housing fail. I replaced both lines and it has been okay since.
Current situation: Took a long trip in the car this weekend. Saturday I (after checking all fluid levels before I left) drove for 6 hours straight without stopping. About 400 miles. Temperatures have been mild this weekend so I hardly used the heat. *I live in PA and we've mostly been experiencing normal winter weather up until this weekend* For some reason I didn't check fluids before my return trip home today. About 3 hours into the trip the temperature gauge began to rise quickly so I pulled off the side of the road, let it cool down, and topped off the coolant tank with water (all I had on the road). The car functioned normally for the next two hours, then it did it again. This time I heard a strange noise coming for the dash (suspect heater core area). Again I pulled off the road, let it cool down some, and then topped off the tank again. Now I'm really paying attention to noises and gauge levels and also tried the heat. I'm getting intermittent heat, noises from the center of the dash, and temp gauge rising and falling. I'm thinking there is air in the system. It would seem I'm losing coolant somewhere but I can not see anything under the hood and it doesn't help that the coolant tank over flow has dumped some fluid too.
I have made it to a place I'm going to be at for the next few hours before I head home. I'm going to let the car cool down and then check levels again and also smell the exhaust for a sweet smell to try and determine if I'm having a head gasket problem or something else.
Anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks
History: About 40K miles ago I was having a cooling issue that I determined to be a faulty thermostat. I replaced it along with the timing belt and water pump. Sometime around that same point I replaced the coolant tank because of a small crack in the bottom of it. About 6K miles ago I noticed the coolant tank was at the minimum mark. I topped it off with G12 and it seemed to be fine. A short while after this I had one of the coolant lines to the oil filter housing fail. I replaced both lines and it has been okay since.
Current situation: Took a long trip in the car this weekend. Saturday I (after checking all fluid levels before I left) drove for 6 hours straight without stopping. About 400 miles. Temperatures have been mild this weekend so I hardly used the heat. *I live in PA and we've mostly been experiencing normal winter weather up until this weekend* For some reason I didn't check fluids before my return trip home today. About 3 hours into the trip the temperature gauge began to rise quickly so I pulled off the side of the road, let it cool down, and topped off the coolant tank with water (all I had on the road). The car functioned normally for the next two hours, then it did it again. This time I heard a strange noise coming for the dash (suspect heater core area). Again I pulled off the road, let it cool down some, and then topped off the tank again. Now I'm really paying attention to noises and gauge levels and also tried the heat. I'm getting intermittent heat, noises from the center of the dash, and temp gauge rising and falling. I'm thinking there is air in the system. It would seem I'm losing coolant somewhere but I can not see anything under the hood and it doesn't help that the coolant tank over flow has dumped some fluid too.
I have made it to a place I'm going to be at for the next few hours before I head home. I'm going to let the car cool down and then check levels again and also smell the exhaust for a sweet smell to try and determine if I'm having a head gasket problem or something else.
Anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks