DO I NEED YOUR HELP GUYS....

I have a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee. The truck has been a godsend for me. BUT now what?.......

Sunday, when I was headed into the city with the air on everything was fine, but as soon as I was stopped at a red light or in traffic, the gauge immediately climbed into the danger zone. I spent fathers day with my daughter for three hours with full heat on. Not fun. Yesterday, was cool. Without air on, the gauge would pin everytime I stopped even for a minute. The spraying of the "brown" coolant all over the engine compartment didn't happen until last night when I was parked with the engine on, but no ac. The amount of steam was incredible. After cooling down, I filled the system with water and drove five minutes home. The pictures are from today. I need to know what parts to try first because I have to do this myself except if its something I can't handle. I spent half the night on the Jeep forums. The thermostat doesn't look that hard to replace. There is only water in the system now so I need to flush it. On youtube there are 100 ways to flush. I need the easiest. And my apartment does not have an outside hose connection. What would you suggest? Today, after I took off the radiator cap before starting, all was fine for about 10 minutes from a cold start, I had to rev it a bit to get the brown water in the radiator to start bubbling and the leakage starting from where the hose is attached to the cracked plastic in the picture. Liquid did not come from the crack at first, but where the hose is clamped to the plastic radiator cover where the crack is. I have no idea if the crack was there before this started happening. When it started steaming the temp was fine and the fan was not running. That's as best as I can explain it. I have pictures, but don't know how to add them? I put the photos in a gallery under my username..jeep36111

 

First off. If you keep running it to the point it overheats, you are going to blow up your motor if you havent already damage it. I can not express this enough. Do not drive it till you fix it. Second, brown water is rust in your coolant system. So you will need to flush it after you fix it. Pick any way you find easiest to flush it. The reason it doesnt leak at first is because when cool, its not under pressure. As it gets hot and then over the boiling point, it pushes though the crack. But regardless of that, you are going to need to replace your entire radiator. That is not a fixable crack. As for your thermostat, it could be stuck in the open position due to rust and heat but its the crack that is your main issue.

 

Would you suggest I do the flush, stat, then fill to save a little money before a mechanic gets it and just to get it to a service guy to avoid a towing expense or is all that foolish? I thought the crack was just in the plastic fan cover. Thanks for your time in answering.

 

That's an aluminum radiator with plastic side tanks. It looks like the neck that the hose attaches to is cracked. No glue in the world is strong enough to hold it together under 18 psi pressure. Without pressure water boils at 212*F and that's only 17* above normal operating temperature set by the thermostat. Your best bet would be to leave the thermostat out, wrap the f*** out of the cracked neck with duck tape, leave the cap loose, and drive it slowly to the mechanic. You're not going to be able to do an adequate flush without a garden hose so just drain it and fill it up with water. Be sure you drain it into a pan or over a storm drain so the apartment manager doesn't get upset with the rusty water all over the parking lot.