So you guys wanna hear some bullshit. My friend just got a 1992 Lexus sc400 as a surprise for Christmas(he's been needing a car). I picked it out from a private seller and he and his mom went on a test drive(it was driven for 30 minutes and was driven hard) and briefly inspected the car(engine, tires, checked for rust, fluids, obvious leaks). Everything seemed great. It's in decent condition and the engine seemed strong still. Mind you it has 155,000 miles, I know these things are built very well.
So anyway, his mom buys it for him knowing that the only thing wrong with it is the heat doesn't work. She paid $2200.
So today she takes it to some small mechanic and he said that theres a crack in the radiator that is dripping down into something causing the heat not to work(does this make any sense to you guys? He said this was a $1300 repair, $500 just to swap the radiator) and that theres a small/minor oil leak that will require the engine to be pulled(this doesn't sound true unless it's a rear main seal, even then he quoted this at $3000). Sadly I heard this from his mom and she's not exactly sure what the guy said so I'm not sure how true that statement is.
Either way, doesn't this sound absurd? $5000 for a radiator swap and a minor oil leak?
Heat not turning on is usually a thermostat, 70 dollar part at the most. If the car's not overheating, the water pump is fine. A new radiator could cost you a couple hundred, but you should have dude install it himself, other than burping the coolant it's one of the easiest major repairs you can do on a car. Honestly with the heat failing, I would suspect your leak comes from somewhere in the thermostat/water pump area. Maybe a bad gasket. I don't know much about the 4l 1uz motor though so I'm going to quit speculating.
Either way, that mechanic is trying to Fuck you over so hard.
Wouldn't leaking at the heater be a cause of the heater not working? or the heater being clogged up?
But yeah way too much for a repair
>>14018988
I wish my friend would realize this because I feel like they think I'm the bad guy for picking this car. I know that swapping the radiator is easy and there's no way I'd let him go to a shop to get that swapped. They'd charge too much.
The previous owner said he replaced the thermostat because he thought that might be the issue. The AC still blows fine and cools. It's just the heat.
1UZ maintenance and trouble shooting can be found online, and parts will be fairly cheap.
Generally the heat wont work if the coolant isn't reaching the heater core. For a radiator swap that is something you (or they) can do themselves and do a little research.
$5k can buy you another car, or two. Hell for that much they could probably take it to a dealer and get a fuck load of other things done.
>>14019018
What makes sense to me is that the radiator would have to be leaking so quickly that it would not allow the heater core to have any coolant. However it isn't leaking this fast at all. Not even close honestly. This would also cause the engine go run hot but it stays normal to be honest.
There's not much wrong with the car my friend is just getting misdiagnosed it seems
>>14019041
Is it possible you could list reasons the heat in a car wouldn't work? Generally speaking. Assuming the rest of the engine is fine
>>14018947
>So today she takes it to some small mechanic and he said that theres a crack in the radiator that is dripping down into something causing the heat not to work(does this make any sense to you guys? He said this was a $1300 repair, $500 just to swap the radiator)
Sounds more like a heater core than a radiator. Heater core is pretty fucking shit to replace, I can see it being an assload of money pretty easily. Main seals on either side are easiest with the engine out, which is a lot of labor being billed out at $100/hr or whatever. If it's the front you might as well replace the belts and water pump since they'll have to come off anyway.
>>14019077
That's very true. If it is the heater core then I can see it being a pain in the dick. Especially considering the way things are packed in there. And I can also understand that the rear main seal would be easiest that way. But sadly I don't know if that's the issue because I didn't speak to the mechanic directly.
who the fuck would pull a longitudinally mounted engine to do a main seal. you just drop the trans.
if its a front seal it's even easier especially considering he's removing the radiator anyway.
anyway op, you realize there is more than one mechanic in the world right? just take it somewhere else and get another quote.
also
>i wasnt there so uh i dont really know what he said
so go next time. this thread is pointless if you dont even know what he said.
>>14019163
I was working while the car was taken. I wish I could have gone.
They plan to take it to another mechanic tomorrow or the following day
>>14019034
inb4 they try and make you pay for part of the repairs because "you told us to buy this car."
>>14019245
Nah they would never. I would help them buy some of it for sure though. I feel bad
>>14018947
hey there's coolant in the rad, right? because stupid people do stupid shit.
>>14019296
Yeah! Although when he bought it he did have to add some to it
>>14019336
should probably check to see if more needs to be added because i totally drove my car all through winter with like, no antifreeze in the radiator because i was young and retarded.
>>14019276
I know that feel. My friend's girlfriend was interested in my old car when I was getting ready to sell it. I didn't want to sell it to her, not because lol women, but because it was a 30 year old car and I didn't want the guilt of her potentially being stranded when 30 year old parts inevitably gave out.
>>14019067
Generally, it happens when there is mineral or old coolant build up in the core from old coolant not being replaced on schedule, build up from not emptying out the when new coolant is placed or adding plain water vs distilled. Just going off memory here. Dont flame too hard. If the leak is there is probably due to lack of circulation for the coolant and pressure builds just enough to cause a leak.
>>14018947
here's my thoughts. This is the only way I'm making sense of what I'm reading. there's a radiator leak, possibly someone threw in stop leak which probably closed it and clogged the water pump/heater core/thermostat. If the coolant system was clogged it may have lead to overheating which gave a head gasket leak and now oil and coolant are intermixing. Now...
What I'd do here:
1.check for obvious leaking. If it's the rad why not you and your buddy do the replacement?
2.check the oil and check the coolant. If either are at all milky you probably have the head gasket issue. that would mean a head gasket and maybe water pump replacement I guess (someone help me on that). I'd have it done.
3. if things seem like in a decent enough state then you may either have the thermostat being stuck closed or the heater core is clogged. What I'd suggest here is doing 2 things: go buy some coolant and find some instructions and drain the rad (I have a corolla it's not terribly hard). fill it up with some radiator flush and top off with water. Drive it around for like 3 or 4 days and let it work its way in to clean the coolant system. Drain it out again and try to flush out the system with water. Next there are two hoses going into the firewall. These go to the heater core which is like a mini radiator in the cabin you get heat from. open the clips and work the hoses off. Now you want to flush the shit out of each direction forward and back several times for like 10-15 minutes each time. If it's clogged at some point you may see a lot of shit come out of there. I recommend using some clear plastic tubing from home depot which if you dip in hot water can be slid over the heater core openings. After that refill the heater core with coolant and put the hoses back on. Refill the cooling system with coolant and run the car in a ventilated area with the heat on and start adding coolant again from the rad cap until it stops...
>>14021224
...gulping it up. At this point you will either have some more heat or you won't. If not you should consider changing the thermostat. An easy way to figure out if you need to do that is feel the heater core hoses for heat. If both are hot then the thermostat is at least partially working. If not hot at all then it should be changed (and hot on only one of them implies blockage inside the heater core). Again this is not a hard thing. Go to autozone or whatever, get the part and change it. Now at that point if you're still not getting heat well I don't know. But for maybe $100 you covered your bases.
Now if it did work I would also suggest a few things for the car. Redline makes an good injector cleaner that would be good to run in the fuel but whatever brand is fine. I'd recommend spraying some Seafoam into the crank case and driving it for a few days and then changing the oil with some high milage oil and a new oil filter. I'd also take a look at the brake pads to see where they are at. Changing disc brake pads isn't particularly hard if you have a jack. Also changing the spark plugs and air filter aren't too hard to do. You need a spark plug socket is all with an extension bar.
Anyway I hope this helped. I leave learned this all through trial and error and forums and youtube over the last several years. If you change the pads I recommend Hawk HPS semi-metallics. They are quite good. For oil I personally use Royal Purple. It has excellent lubrication characteristics. People will say Redline is another good one but honestly it's not. I hear Amsoil is very good too.
>>14021224
BTW when I say rad flush I mean something like Prestone Rad flush + cleaner. Good for the system anyhow, it'll help lubricate stuff like the water pump in addition to cleaning. Also remind your friend that maintaining the coolant system is a very important part of car maintenance and should be done every year or two at least. People worry far too much about oil and not about coolant.
>>14021290
one last thing if things do point to the heater core issue, which after reading some more sounds by far the most likely thing...
-one possible approach is to simply reverse the heater core hoses and run the car with heat on... but you blow all the shit back into the system....
-what I did because I'm in canada and it was winter when I did it. pulled off heater core hoses. connected them with this plastic inside the tubes joiner from home depot, attached the clear plastic hoses to heater core inlet and outlet... then drove down to an unsupervised car wash and used the pressure washer to flush from each side a bunch of times.
If the coolant system has a lot of shit in it and you don't flush it though, you can expect the problem to return eventually. That's why I suggest the full flush. I'd just try the heater core flush right off the bat and see what happens. It's so low effort. If the old owner said he changed the thermostat already then it's probably safe to leave it alone. But for right now, Run the car until warm and feel both hoses running into the firewall. I suspect you will find one is warm and the other is ice cold. Or maybe even both cold. But it'll be a sign the heater core flush might help.
Alexis
i had gs400 and i paid about $600 for a new radiator at a lexus mechanic. also get the power steering pump checked out, if they start to leak thats gonna fuck up the alternator and cost you another 1k in repairs
>>14023855
yskr yhr
taje t
take the black pill
>>14023898
wat
Hey guys, op here. Haven't checked this at all today, my bad. So I was looking into it and I think it could be a few things. I don't think the heater core is leaking. I think that it might just be clogged or that the vacuum valve switch is just messed up. Which could be an easy and cheap fix. There might also be an air bubble in the coolant system which could cause this.
If there is a leak in the radiator, we can knock that out ourselves in a couple of hours.
I think that the oil leak might be the rear main seal because I'm not sure what else it could be. And if it is that, I'm not gonna bother fixing it.
>>14023958
Oh and about the power steering. It's on its way out think. The previous owner had the alternator replaced and during turns while at speed, the steering gets super stiff. I know its supposed to stiffen a little, but it gets very tough. I'll look into that later tonight when I look at the car
