I hit a huge hole with my lude (stupid sloppy road construction). Either way, about 5 min down the road i smell antifreeze, I watch my temp gauge, as soon as it jumps i park it. Next day i walk to where i left it and pop the cap and pour some coolant in it to find where its leaking. Its coming out of the bottom of the radiator somewhere near the center next to the butterfly drain plug. Its not coming out of the plug just near it about as fast as i can pour it in. Can anyone tell me what is broke here and how to fix it? Also, i had to drive it the short distance back to my place and since it was cold i could make it without the engine overheating but whenever its idling now it will rev to about 2000rpm and stay there and after 30 sec it start to rise and fall btwn 1200 and 2000 rpm making it sound like im just tapping the gas over and over. Is this related to the no antifreeze problem or is something else broke? thanks for the help

 

and btw....its a h22a motor with a p13 ECU (i think) and the radiator is from the h23a1

 

get a new radiator
mine was about $120 from autobarn

six 10mm bolts (with AC installed)
or
four 10mm bolts (without AC installed)
two hose clamps

do yourself a favor and DONT START THE CAR ANYMORE

its hunting for an idle because the fast idle (extreme cold warmup) is determined by antifreeze going thru a hose into a sensor under the throttle body...when there is air in that hose (like your situation), the engine thinks it -10* degrees and starts raising the idle to raise oil pressure and help warm the engine faster to protect itself.

change the radiator, add coolant, and monitor the level in your overflow tank (near battery) for a few days until the engine works all the air out of the system.

~boomer

 

thank you very much. Another thought that occured to me, is the temperature gauge in my car (h23a1 original) good enough for the h22a motor or does the h22a overheat faster?

 

i bought a new radiator when i swapped my h22a1 because i didnt want any contamination to the new block.
i rebuilt the motor with all new parts, so a mildly used and corroded radiator could ruin my brand new water pump and begin eating away at the inner block passsages, etc.
u get the idea

the two radiators are different but since the radiator is already very overefficient at cooling the engine (at least on hondas) i dont think its an issue.

yes the h22a1 and h23a1 use the same ECT sensor for the gauge

however the ECT thermo switches (mainly ecu load data and fan operation) are different between the 2 motors

~boom

 

Mouse > if you do the work yourself make sure to bleed the air out of the system once you get it filled up. Once bled a bit you can add a little more antifreeze and bleed off a little more.

Chris