Calling all car gurus...Where oh where has my coolant gone?

It actually can evaporate with out a trace that is obvious. I’m sure your mech checked your oil to see if it’s leaking there. It can leak ever so slightly into a cylinder through a cracked block and viola evaporate without causing much trouble with the engine running. Has he pressure tested the system? After the car has warmed up do you see any vapor in the exhaust?

He said he pressure tested the resevoir because I asked if the tank could be cracked.

I hav’nt noticed anything unusual wth the exhaust. It s not overheating, the temp gage hovers right in the middle at normal. :-/ Guess I’ll find out soon enough. lol

Good Luck!!!

Things to check:
pull your oil dipstick, and see if their is a brown milky substance. If there is, your radiator fluid is mixing with the oil.
Your radiator cap may be shot. It is supposed to let out water when your car overheats, but when they get old, they often stay open, and you lose all your water.
Check the bottom of your water pump. There is a seep hole. If you see any water on it, the water pump needs replacement.
If your thermostat has baked, it will allow water to flow continuously. I doubt that is the problem here, but it is something to consider.
If the heat exchanger on the dashboard wall has a leak, you will lose all your water when the car is warm.
Yes, there is a lot to check. Best thing to do is to fill it up with water, run the engine, and watch it from underneath.

@filmfann

Well..I hope my mechanic knows all that!
Cars! lol

My experience is that mechanics often do not. I can’t think of anything @filmfann missed, but I have blown head gaskets without the temp gauge showing any problems.

I’ve also cracked a block before, but that was in a POS that blew the water pump a month prior and I didn’t care enough about the rig or plan to keep it long enough to warrant fixing it. Even after sealing the weep-hole in the water pump, that thing was up to about a gallon of water every three miles, yet it never steamed visibly out the tailpipe… though cars behind me got sprayed with liquid water. My boss was worried about the paint on his new Lexus after following me one day. Good thing there wasn’t any antifreeze left in there!) So it is possible to have a cracked block or blown head gasket without showing all of the normal signs like temperature guage spiking or steam out the tailpipe.

@jerv

Well..that’s all positive sharing! haha

I’ll be curious to get the diagnosis, for the 3rd time! I’ll post an update when I find out.

It’s been a good car but I have already been looking at new ones, soooo, if it’s some huge repair…bye bye baby!

Thermostats and radiator caps are cheap.
Heater cores…. depends on the car, but can get a bit expensive. Last one I blew was $400 to have replaced.
Head gasket… I’ve done then myself, but they are labor-intensive enough to be pricey if you take it to a garage; most of the cost is labor (about a day, and 6–10 hours at shop rates adds up!) About $50 for DIY, or $500–1200 if you take it in.
Block, forget it.

filmfan is right, there is lots to check and sometimes it takes a long time to find a slight leak. I was a fleet mech for pepsi and sometimes we could look a week, off and on, for missing fluid.

Head gasket.

It’s my water pump…sooo..could be worse…‘Silver’ will be back on the trail Monday! lol

Thanks for the help everyone!

W00t! Water pumps are (usually) easy and relatively cheap, so I’m glad to hear you got lucky :)