Leaking Coolant Gasket

[Karl Stevens]

I have a coolant leak in my 7.4L. It leaks in two places on the intake manifold near the oil filler tube and the heater house fitting. I tried to carefully tighten the bolts to see if that would help. The would not budge. Of course, I don't want to tear it all apart to replace the gaskets. Is there a safe "stop leak" product that can be used without causing problems with the engine or water pump?

 

[Karl Stevens]

Don't know why the photo won't display. Right click on it and open in a new window.

 

[Molson02536]

I have a coolant leak in my 7.4L. It leaks in two places on the intake manifold near the oil filler tube and the heater house fitting. I tried to carefully tighten the bolts to see if that would help. The would not budge. Of course, I don't want to tear it all apart to replace the gaskets. Is there a safe "stop leak" product that can be used without causing problems with the engine or water pump?

There is no stop leak that will work to fix the issue with a intake manifold leak. I'm about to start the same project with the 02 Jimmy I just bought and the intake manifold gasket is just starting to show sighs of a leak. If the weather doesn't get any warmer, there is a good chance that I'll get one of the shops here to do it for me.

Back to your question, NO there is no safe stop leak!!!! Reason being is that if its a external leak, if you use a stop leak and it does work and stop the leak. The internal coolant pressure may cause a internal leak and that would cause you to end up rebuilding your engine. The bright side of taking your manifold apart, you can clean up of work on your engine since it's apart.

Doing a intake manifold gasket takes about 4-5 hours with pressure testing the cooling system and don't forget to change the engine oil and filter after 600 miles after the gasket has been replaced just to flush out any coolant that may have mixed with your oil. In the mean time, if you don't have a internal coolant leak, loosen up your radiator cap so any internal coolant pressure will flow into your coolant reservoir.

Keep us posted and keep an eye on your engine oil for coolant mixing

Molson02536