Small Coolant Leak - EGR Hoses?

JPinnell · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2017 12:54 pm

I have a small coolant leak, 2 teaspoons or so on the garage floor in the morning, directly under the engine, but slightly offset to the drivers side. I had been topping off the coolant tank occasionally this Fall, but never much needed. My wife drives the Jeep and we only recently started parking it inside, hence seeing the leak. Front of the motor is dry, nothing obvious, but I have not crawled underneath. My research indicates the small 5/8" hoses going to the EGR Cooler as the likely culprit. Is this easy to do from the top side? Underneath? How long should I allow? Will I need to drain all the coolant to do so?

This is the wife/kid hauler and sees daily use, but only local. I can take it out of service for a Sat/Sun but not during the week. I have an unheated shop, tools, but no lift.

History - 05 Libby has 140K on it. Has a GDE tune, but fairly stock. We've owned for 4yrs and bought with 100K on it. I swapped the TB, etc shortly after purchase so the water pump is fairly new. I did belts, radiator hoses, and coolant flush then.

flash7210 · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2017 1:20 pm

If you have a cooling system pressure tester you could pump it up to 16psi and see what starts dripping.

Getting down to the EGR coolant lines is a bit of a pain.
I recommend at least removing the fuel filter assembly to give you more room. Removing the intake elbow will help also.
Usually its the two small cooler lines that leak. If you work quickly with the hoses and clamps you wont loose too much coolant. Just be sure to top off and work any air bubble out of the system.

Lastly, I recommend completely deleting the EGR stuff. https://shop.sasquatchparts.com/ intake elbow kits will help you forget about the EGR and its cooler leaks.

WWDiesel · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2017 1:33 pm

You can use a good quality 3/8 fuel line hose and some small screw clamps to replace the EGR cooler lines.
The area can be accessed by unbolting the fuel filter head assembly and moving it over to the side to give room to get down to the EGR hoses.

But as flash advised, best solution is to totally get rid of all that junk including the EGR valve, EGR cooler, and FCV by installing a Weeks elbow kit from Sasquatch Parts... :wink:

The elbow kit will keep the soot out of the intake; the soot dumping into the intake manifold is very bad for the engine along with it mixes with the oil vapors from the CCV system it make huge amounts of sludge in the intake manifold that sticks to everything and clogs up the manifold!!!

JPinnell · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2017 2:20 pm

So is it 3/8 or 5/8 for the EGR coolant hoses? I've seen both listed. I want to buy enough ahead of time.

I plan to do the REAL EGR delete likely this Summer. Rodents chewed up the Glow Plug Harness and while I did patch it up I would prefer to replace with new. I figured I'd pro-actively swap the original ceramic glow plugs out then. I'm worried if I have issues with extraction the family hauler is down, so will tackle that when the weather is warm and I have plenty of time. I've done GPs in my VW and the Ford and been lucky so far.

Wife/Kids usually travel to Granny's house so I could do the work leisurely over a couple of weekends, order parts, etc.

papaindigo · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2017 2:29 pm

You can email GDE and double check but last I recall Keith said with a GDE tune you can delete the EGR coolant hoses.

WWDiesel · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2017 3:44 pm

JPinnell wrote:

So is it 3/8 or 5/8 for the EGR coolant hoses? I've seen both listed. I want to buy enough ahead of time.

I plan to do the REAL EGR delete likely this Summer. Rodents chewed up the Glow Plug Harness and while I did patch it up I would prefer to replace with new. I figured I'd pro-actively swap the original ceramic glow plugs out then. I'm worried if I have issues with extraction the family hauler is down, so will tackle that when the weather is warm and I have plenty of time. I've done GPs in my VW and the Ford and been lucky so far.

Wife/Kids usually travel to Granny's house so I could do the work leisurely over a couple of weekends, order parts, etc.

The small hoses are 3/8 and you can use good quality fuel hose like from NAPA, and the large hoses are 5/8 heater hose. I doubt very seriously that the larger hoses are leaking. Most times the smaller hoses become brittle and crack.

Untill you can do the Weeks elbow kit, you can install a blank off plate to stop the soot from going through the EGR valve. It can be made out of any simple thin metal like the lid off of a soup can etc... If you blank off the exhaust feed to the EGR valve, you can simply plug and remove all the EGR coolant system hoses and forget about coolant leaks in this area! :BANANA:

Also there are some free do-it-yourself tunes available on this forum that you can download and install once you get rid of that EGR crap that will clear the DTC (check engine light) that will be triggered when you remove and discard the EGR valve and the FCV.
See this thread for details:> viewtopic.php?f=98&t=78418

See this thread for block off plate info:> viewtopic.php?f=5&t=76576

racertracer · **Posted:** Sat Jan 28, 2017 7:11 pm

I had the same leak on my original CRD, it turned out to be excessive pressure from a head gasket leak that pushed coolant out.

Do you have pressure under the radiator cap after the CRD has been sitting overnight?

geordi · **Posted:** Sun Jan 29, 2017 9:21 pm

Pressure in the morning after sitting overnight is not necessarily an indication. The best thing to do is the "cold engine test" where you release any possible pressure in the system, and then run the engine for 30 seconds to a minute, and then shut it down and check for pressure again. There should not be any pressure on a stone cold engine. If there is then this strongly suggests the head gasket is leaking, a very common problem with factory setup (bolts and active egr) and 120k or so miles.

This is one of the things I provide service for. If you are not losing a lot of coolant yet and getting alarms, you are a good candidate for installing the studs without having more than a few hours of downtime. The complete service can be done in one day in your driveway. No lift needed. By complete, I include the studs, rockers (optional but suggested) egr delete, new glow plugs, timing belt and water pump, and an engine tune if you don't already have the GDE tune.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

JPinnell · **Posted:** Sun Jan 29, 2017 10:31 pm

Leak is fixed. One of the small hoses was very crusty. Hell of a place to try and access. I pulled the drivers side hood support strut and the fuel filter head. The hard part is getting the hose clamps tight enough. Took 2 tries, 1st time it was just dripping a stream so I had to tear back into it all over. I used 3/8" fuel injection hose that was a bit too stiff.

This should hold for now. Over the Summer I'll clean up that side of the block. EGR Delete, updated intake elbow, new Glow Plug, Harness, etc.

Hopefully no head gasket issue yet. Nothing seems to be overpressure and we have not had any overheating issues. I am running an inline thermostat and that seems to have fallen out of favor? Might be time order one of the rebuildable now that it is available.

I found some more rodent damage, yellow wire to the starter is really chewed up, and several wires on the passenger side by the AC Drier and Vacuum cluster which is probably why Cruise Control quit working.

Thanks for all the help.

geordi · **Posted:** Sun Jan 29, 2017 11:17 pm

JPinnell wrote:

Leak is fixed. One of the small hoses was very crusty. Hell of a place to try and access. I pulled the drivers side hood support strut and the fuel filter head. The hard part is getting the hose clamps tight enough. Took 2 tries, 1st time it was just dripping a stream so I had to tear back into it all over. I used 3/8" fuel injection hose that was a bit too stiff.

This should hold for now. Over the Summer I'll clean up that side of the block. EGR Delete, updated intake elbow, new Glow Plug, Harness, etc.

Hopefully no head gasket issue yet. Nothing seems to be overpressure and we have not had any overheating issues. I am running an inline thermostat and that seems to have fallen out of favor? Might be time order one of the rebuildable now that it is available.

I found some more rodent damage, yellow wire to the starter is really chewed up, and several wires on the passenger side by the AC Drier and Vacuum cluster which is probably why Cruise Control quit working.

Thanks for all the help.

Glad you got it solved! I wish I had a good solution on the wiring problems, electrical issues are hateful and I don't know why the wires are so tasty to rodents.

TURBO-DIESEL-FREAK · **Joined:** Sat Apr 17, 2010 3:29 pm **Posts:** 1167

"I am running an inline thermostat and that seems to have fallen out of favor?"

Most definitely YES it has fallen out of favor. It should not have been installed in the first place.

Take a gander at the following threads,,,

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=25852

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=83766

viewtopic.php?f=167&t=83649

racertracer · **Posted:** Sun Jan 29, 2017 11:50 pm

Oh brother.....

TURBO-DIESEL-FREAK · **Joined:** Sat Apr 17, 2010 3:29 pm **Posts:** 1167

racertracer wrote:

Oh brother.....

If you have something to write about, racertracer, then write something. If you have something to contribute to this thread, then lets have it.

If you are here to sling mud, then that is unacceptable.

racertracer · **Posted:** Mon Jan 30, 2017 5:04 am

Nah, not worth the time.

TURBO-DIESEL-FREAK · **Joined:** Sat Apr 17, 2010 3:29 pm **Posts:** 1167

racertracer wrote:

Nah, not worth the time.

Then why did you post in the first place?

jws84_02 · **Posted:** Mon Jan 30, 2017 6:07 pm

TURBO-DIESEL-FREAK wrote:

racertracer wrote:

Nah, not worth the time.

Then why did you post in the first place?

Because he doesn't want another thread turned into a doo doo show

Small Coolant Leak - EGR Hoses?

Who is online