Hi Gang - Check this out! My car was just idling (luckily) on the street infront of the house, I was just returning from visiting a friend (about a 35mile trip). On my way home I noticed that the temp gauge did not budge and was sleeping on the cold peg all the way home, I ran the car moderately (in terms of speed and rpms).
Anyway as I pulled infront of the house and was letting the turbo warm down. I was moving my wife's car out of the way and as I walked towards the car, I saw the most massive explosion, looked like something from a movie! In all my years messing, modding and working on my cars and at my uncle's shop, I have never witnessed or seen something like this.
I ran towards the car with Carl Lewis like speed and found coolant flowing like Niagara Falls. I jumped in the car and pulled it into the garage immediately and then shut her down. I glanced down and saw that the temp gauge was sitting at around half, which I figured was because there was no coolant flowing to cool the engine, so the engine temps were starting to climb.
From my investigation the rad hose erupted with incredible force (pics to come tomorrow). The weird thing was this hose was not on the thermostat side, it was the OTHER hose!! I first thought, faulty thermostat seized built pressure in the hose and caused it to swell to failure. But thats impossible as its the other hose that erupted and is connected to the block with just an aluminum neck and an open port to the block. So how did pressure build so high that the hose would explose with such drama.
As an aside, I replaced the water pump last summer due to bearing failure, but I thoroughlly purged 101% air out of the system, I have a neat compressor operated vacuum to draw all the air out of the block and hoses.
I am at a total loss guys on this one. Please note that this hose that exploded was only a year old and not an old dry rotting jobbie.
So can you guys tell me what you think? I am curious, confused and pants crappy - the three "C"s.
I just got back from buying a new hose, new thermostat, and new rad cap, and will replace everything tomorrow and see how things go after I run the car and thoroughlly purge it.
Yikes!
Yasin