allenworsham

My daughter just bought a 2009 HHR 2.4 with 80,000 miles on it from her 86 year old grandfather. The car is is good shape overall, but there is a water leak that appears to be coming from the tube between the thermostat and the water pump. I pulled off the engine cover and put the car on jack stands and crawled underneath. It appears that the leak is coming from the area where the joint is on the metal tube where the smaller section on the water pump side joins into the larger section on the thermostat side. It could be coming from above, but I can't get my eyes or fingers in there. (see photo below)

I don't see a way for me to be able to get in there especially with a recovering torn rotator cuff on my right shoulder, so it looks like I will have to take it into a shop. Any comments or advice on this? This is my first time working on an HHR, but I have worked on almost all of my cars over the years.

843de

to the forum Allen!

Yes it's awful tight in the engine bay of an HHR, the phrase "10lbs in a 5lb sack" comes to mind.

You may want to swing by your local auto parts store tomorrow to pick up a leak detection kit. They include an ultraviolet dye to add to the coolant, and some sort of "blacklight" that will cause the dye to flourese making a leak really stand out.

Of course a good radiator shop can do the test and trace the leak for you. And professional repairs may be your best bet. HHR cooling systems are notoriously hard to bleed air from due to the heater core being the system's high point. A radiator shop can pull a vacuum on the system to evacuate any entrained air, and reduce the chance of a gas bubble causing a hot spot which can lead to a cracked head or blown head gasket.

whopper

x2 - it is tight in that area - there really is not much room to maneuver, especially with any sort of injury etc.. Keep us posted if you can on the final outcome.

I would not expect it would be a very expensive repair - you might want to consider throwing in a new thermostat if they are tearing that area apart.

The old style thermostats have a rubber gasket that is known to deteriorate and jam the thermostat open - the new ones from GM don't have the rubber gasket, and some people here swear by the GM ones rather than an aftermarket one.

donbrew

If you can get to them.... there are just 2 bolts holding the t-stat housing to the block.

You A) remove the t-stat housing top
B) remove the 2 bolts
C) remove the transfer pipe

Once you are this far, go get the special tool and replace the water pump, since you have to do all that again.

I have seen the tool in Advance stores for about $30-$40. I think they call it a timing sprocket tool. I's half a cup with a couple of captured screws.

allenworsham

Thanks for the input! :-)

After sitting down with the parts and service guys at the Chevy dealership, I found the cost to replace the seals on the transfer pipe would be $400-$450 parts and labor. The parts guy printed out a schematic which shows things better and after looking at everything I will give it a shot tomorrow. I picked up all the parts (2 seals for the pipe, 1 seal for the thermostat housing where it joins the block, a new thermostat and Dex-Cool coolant) which cost me about $100-$110. I should be able to the majority from the top side but will have to crawl underneath to put in the seal between the pipe and water pump. The water pump is working fine so I am not going to push it.

2oodoor

Just curious if bleeding air from the heater core culd be helped by raising the front of the car up...theres gotta be a way besides pulling vaccuum I would hope.
this sounds like an inevitable repair need so thanks for the tips!

whopper

Yup, some members here have found it helpful to raise the front end. I've had good luck with just turning the heater on full to dissipate the heat, and add a bit at a time to the rad, and revving the motor from time to time to get a flow going thru the system, which helps work the bubble out. Maybe I've just been lucky.

allenworsham

Well, it all came down to a bad/worn seal in the thermostat housing. The seal between the thermostat housing and the water transfer tube was worn and leaking. So when removing the thermostat housing and water transfer tube you have to replace both of the seals (1 at each end of the Water Transfer Tube) as well as the thermostat housing seal/gasket to the block and replace all the coolant, I purchased the parts and coolant (about $100 total) and was going to do the work myself. After looking at it there was no way that I could do it after my right rotator cuff surgery. So I checked out the listed labor hours for doing this repair through the Chevy dealer and through Pep-Boys and they both have the standard 2.4 labor hours. Since this is a straight forward repair and Pep-Boys was cheaper than the dealer, I took it to them along with all the parts and coolant I bought. Cost for labor was $260 and parts/coolant were $100 for a total cost of $360 to repair the coolant leak. I talked with the mechanic who did the work about it and he said that he had to have another mechanic help him to do it as he had to have one person on top of the engine while he was underneath the engine, which made me feel better about the whole thing.

The real frustrating part was that when I went in and talked with the Service Manager at the Chevy Dealer to get an estimate and gave him the year/make/model/mileage on the HHR he said that it had a 5 year 100,000 mile warranty on the entire drive train which would include this repair to the cooling system. The caveat was that as long as the 5 years were not up from the original sale date of the original owner. That 5 year warranty ended the end of May and my father in law had started having the temp warning going off in May but just never took it down to the dealer to have it checked out. Oh well. At least the HHR is now in good shape for my daughter and I am not worrying about her car overheating.

donbrew

And I thought $72/hr was outrageous at my local Chevy dealer!

But they most likely charge a higher rate if you supply the parts.

allenworsham

No, that is the going rate regardless of the parts. The joys of living in So. Calif. where the hourly labor rate for must shops in my area averages about $100 per hour.