3rd radiator pinhole leak - possible danger found

[brads]

I have a 2010 golf TDI and now I noticed leaking of coolant on the garage floor for the 3rd time.
The last two times they covered it and just replaced the radiator but both times said there was a pinhole leak in the radiator which they had never seen before. This time they said It wasn't covered and that it would be $950 for a new one with labor etc. I topped up the car with water and brought it home just down the road. I ordered a radiator from my local supply shop for $200. When I removed the fan and radiator from the car I noticed what looked like someone had ground a tiny little hole in one of the veins of the radiator. I looked at the matching area where the fans mate up with the back of the radiator and sure enough there is a little metal clip that was all worn off and chafing the fin on the radiator. This I guess was caused by a little more vibration than normal / normal diesel vibration. When I took off the radiator and looked at it carefully, one of the supports for the fans stuck out more than all the others and this was the support with the clip on it that was worn and had been chafing the vein on the radiator. I cut and sanded down the fan support that was high and removed the metal clip, put the stuff back together, put in the coolant and fired it up. I took some pics of this.

Anybody else have a failed radiator or am I the only one so far?
this is bull****, they could have kept this from happening a second and third time now by using some common sense. I can also see where they cut back the wire when they removed the fan to see if it had been chafed too.

Dealers are aceholes. Their mechanics on the other hand or mostly cool and this guy told me how to do the radiator job myself and safe mucho dinero but this should have been covered.

I don't know if this may be a hidden issue for others out there or what but can plainly see that the design is too close and doesn't allow for movement or vibration in this area. I'll take the fans back out in 6 months and see if there is any more wear going on before I'm convinced and relieved that this fixed it.
Good luck

This image is of the chafed vein on the radiator

this image is the high area that was rubbing on the radiator, you can see where I have started notching it out and eventually sanded it smooth, you can also see the clip that was rubbing in this and the next photo.

 

[nikhsub1]

And this wasnt covered under warranty because?

 

[Abacus]

No kidding. I'd have threatened them with legal action if they said that.

 

[brads]

And this wasnt covered under warranty because?

yeah, they saw that I had a scuff on the facia and undercover. I said that it was from a tire tread giving my front the slapdown and that was it. Then they started up on the you must have had an impact.

I swear I have had no structure damage, accidents or impacts on this vehicle and this also doesn't explain the first two times this happened.

this whole thing stinks as much as my ongoing freying seat threads debacle, but I grabbed a $200 http://www.nissens.com OEM radiator and learned how to do it myself, so something came good out of it and I think I actually found a solution to the problem as well. The other thing was I wasn't going to bend over and let them do me with their $950.

 

[Timujin]

Congrats on the find.

Sometimes you just got to take the ball and run.

 

[Cogen Man]

I'd be all over them like a fat kid on a smartie. Did you take these pics in and show them ? Contact VWoA and have a talk with them about this. Going out to check that area on my 2011 Golf's.
They think they have ya with the tire tread slapdown statement. Unfortunately they might. Sucks big time. But, at least you learned some maintenance procedures.

 

[green600]

MKV jetta fan/radiator clearance issues

I have 2005.5 MKV jetta and have been smelling coolant for some time, but have had no leaks that we could detect. Just last week my wife parked at work and when she got out there was a puddle on the ground. She called me and I picked the car up and the coolant resevoir was about 1/2 full. I drove it home 44 mi and it did not leak anymore until I got home and shut it off again.

I started troubleshooting and when I squeezed the lower radiator hose, i could hear the leak on the drivers side, but coolant was dripping on the passenger side.

I tore the car apart and found the same thing, the metal clip holding wires into the plastic channel had worn a hole in one of the tubes. Since this is an early build of the new MKV platform the radiator is an odd number and has part number changed a few times. Once I got the dealer to get my the current part number I ordered the radiator online for $70.00 less than the dealer.

The wires fit snug in the channel of the fan, so I reassembled the unit without the clip installed. I too will check in 6 months or so to see how things are looking. Although it took 7 years for the first one to wear through, I still believe this is a poor design and VW should have at the very least a TSB issued. I also debated about spacing the fans away from the radiator, but thought better of it.

 

[sgoldste01]

I wonder if the OP was ever able to get warranty coverage on this?

 

[HaveBulldogWillTravel]

He certainly should have...since the dealer never completely fixed the problem. If it had been my car and they denied coverage, I'd have been in small claims court vs. the dealer AND VWoA.

 

[dpg]

Good find. I'll make sure to check the clips when I've got the car apart soon

 

[jasong70]

Hey!

I've replaced 2 rads in my 2010 Golf. The last time they replaced it, they said their did me a favor because it was "probably a rock"

I may have to do some exploratory work to see if this is happening each time.

I think this could be soldered however rather than replacing. That's what they used to do back in the day,

 

[TDI_Timmy]

Hey!

I've replaced 2 rads in my 2010 Golf. The last time they replaced it, they said their did me a favor because it was "probably a rock"

I may have to do some exploratory work to see if this is happening each time.

I think this could be soldered however rather than replacing. That's what they used to do back in the day,

Correct me if I am wrong but isn't the radiator behind the condenser and intercooler? Or at least one of those?

Also not completely sure on this but I recall that solder can't be used on an aluminum radiator. You would need to take it to a radiator shop that has a Tig welder that might be able to do it - needs low enough amps so it doesn't cut through the thin tubes.

 

[jasong70]

Correct me if I am wrong but isn't the radiator behind the condenser and intercooler? Or at least one of those?

Yes, it is. It is pretty sheilded. He also said it was on the back. After asking a few logical questions, he said it would be covered under warranty as a good will gesture.

Also not completely sure on this but I recall that solder can't be used on an aluminum radiator. You would need to take it to a radiator shop that has a Tig welder that might be able to do it - needs low enough amps so it doesn't cut through the thin tubes.

You're probably right. The old rads were copper. These days getting a mechanic to weld anything seems to be more expensive than replacing. That's what we get for being a throw-away society.

 

[N2UADTDI]

10 years ago I had a car with a pin hole in the AC evaporator. Called a friend in the appliance repair business and he said 'they make special epoxies for that'. Did not want to wait till the next day and used JB Weld. It was 10PM at night and I needed the car the next morning. Still have the car and the repair is fine.
I would think an aluminum patch could be made and glued on with JB Weld. But you have to ask yourself - Do you feel lucky? If the repair fails you could overheat the engine.

 

[Dadof5arrows]

Anybody else have a failed radiator or am I the only one so far?

I'm replacing mine now, after 55k miles/26 months of ownership. I talked to the service department at my local VW dealer, he said it wouldn't be covered under the powertrain warranty. I'd rather do it myself, that way I know its done right--and I'll modify the clips so that it hopefully doesn't happen again.
I will document this & write VWoA; maybe someday they will rectify this with their loyal customers. Maybe.

 

[mobhitmn]

Just happened to me @ 101,200 miles, on my 2010 JSW.

Took about 2.5 hours to complete the job. Fans out the bottom, radiator out the top. Lost about 3/4 of a gallon of coolant. A T30 bit w/ 1/4" drive socket, a universal, and a 3" extension made this job pretty easy.

Modified the clip and sanded down the fan shroud.

Radiator was ~ $240, 1 gallon of G13 was ~ $25.

Dealership quoted $950 for the job.

Good luck to anyone else who has this problem.

 

[STRANGETDI]

Subscribed.

 

[RomanL]

is there an easy way to look down and see if this might be an issue for the rest of us?
or does it require some disassembly?

 

[mobhitmn]

You can pull both T30 screws on the left & right sides (closest to the bottom) on the fan shroud. This should give you enough room to gently pry up the shroud and look up at the back of the fan assembly (from the bottom).

Good luck!

 

[tango_28]

Have the same problem with my 09 sportwagen.

 

[jay_fyp]

I've read a couple other threads about this failure so it must be a pretty consistent problem, thanks for posting this with pics. I think this should be a sticky post, possibly with a few more details to the fix. This will be for sure occuring on tons of mkvi's in the future.

Definitely checking mine and making the proper fix to it before it becomes a problem.

 

[tango_28]

So you don't have to pull the front bumper to remove the radiator?

 

[53 willys]

I checked mine and the metal clip was close but not touching.... I'm not sure how any plastic could ever touch.... but If the metal clip is not pushed all the way on it could definitely do some damage.

 

[YukonLT]

Same thing happened to my Golf. Was a pretty easy fix, but bummed it happened at all.

 

[tango_28]

Here is link to removing the fans, once the fan is removed you only have to remove 4 torx screws for the radiator.
http://www.myturbodiesel.com/1000q/a5/radiator-fan-repair-jetta.htm
Here my radiator

 

[tango_28]

New photo radiator.

 

[Ramsey1899]

Having the same issue. This should be fixed at no cost. I'm going to do down that road with VW and if required the DOT.

 

[Ramsey1899]

There is a TSB out for this issue. VW's fix is to add additional spacers so that the plastic housing does not touch the radiator. The TSB is not released in the US for some reason. I encourage all of you to file a complaint with VW and the DOT in hopes that this becomes a mandatory recall. I'd also file a complaint with the BBB.

 

[JLMurphy]

Bump for the latest victim!

My 2010 Golf threw the low coolant warning over the weekend. Topped it off and the light came back on yesterday. Pulled the fan shroud and yep, one holed radiator. Guess I'll be performing some surgery on the shroud before putting it back in.

I may look at adding some grommets to the mounting screws to put some clearance between it and the (new) radiator.

At least the radiator isn't that expensive ($228 at my local dealer)

Yay for me!

Jim
2010 Golf TDI 6MT, 112,000 miles

 

[JLMurphy]

Well that wasn't so bad.

My local dealer had the radiator in stock (coincidence? ) and I installed it today. Took about 2 hours start to finish (I had removed the fan shroud previously, so that saved some time)

A couple of things. First, those stupid radiator quick connects are a pain in the rear to get off. I managed to wiggle the top one off after a while but the lower one was not going to budge and I couldn't figure out a way to get more leverage on it. In the end I decided to simply cut the radiator outlet off as close to the radiator as a I could using a mini hacksaw.

Once that was off I removed the radiator from the car. It came straight up and out, no problems.

Once the radiator was out I removed the lower outlet from the hose and put the cut off end in a vice with a piece of pipe stuck in it to prevent it from collapsing. Then I just tapped on the quick connect with a soft faced hammer and it popped off.

Putting the new radiator in was straightforward. I put some cardboard over the inner face of the core to prevent damage to the fins and it slipped right in. I put a tiny bit of lithium grease on the quick connects and they went on as easy as you please.

I added some spacers to the shroud to try to prevent a recurrence of the problem. I had a plastic drill size guide lying around and cut some spacers out of that. I glued 2 per hole location to give ~1/8" additional clearance.

Filled it back up with coolant and took it for a spin. No leaks so far, so fingers crossed.

Jim