Hello All,

I have a coolant leak at the head gasket, between #3 and 4 but closer to #4 above the freeze plug. It's been leaking coolant for at least two years now, but at a very tolerable rate. I might have to refill a half empty coolant jug about once every 4 months or 5,000 miles.

There had been a green stalagtite of sorts hanging from the block and red heater pipe along with some mixed in stray oil that I carefully cleaned off last week to get a good look at the leak, and although as I said, it doesn't appear to be leaking a lot, it did leave a nice "track" of burnished block starting at the head gasket. Just to be clear, the water pump and heater pipe are not leaking.

This is our red sedan with 310K and I've always used Volvo coolant and the car has never overheated. I've asked a couple of friends and they say that I should let it go until it gets worse or intolerable. The car runs fine and doesn't burn any coolant so I believe this is the only malfunction the head gasket has ever had.

Just wondering how you expoits feel about this. Tonight I put a masking tape date and mileage sticker on the coolant jug to keep better track of the volume of coolant I'm losing vs time/mileage. I should be able to resurrect this post for quite some time to provide updates. The consensus also seems to be that a stop-leak is not an option.

Thanks for your thoughts,

Marty Wolfson