2007 temporary Coolant Error
 

Hi,
I have 2007 and I live in the North East. Its been getting colder but its still in the 40s-50s mostly.
For the last several days I've been getting a red blinking light on the coolant meter, and then a coolant error. this happens immediately when I leave my driveway, but the error/red light goes away by the time I drive a few blocks, and then the needle starts moving up to almost halfway.
So I topped it off with some distilled water and today I didnt get the error.

But does the fact that the coolant needle initially does not move, then after the car warms up, moves to halfway indicate anything in particular? Perhaps the anti-freeze has lost its potency? i'm about to garage it for the winter, but Im thinking about draining/replacing the coolant in the spring.
Thanks

The blinking light indicated you were low on coolant, the fact it went off after a short amount of running time was likely due to the coolant in your system heating up and expanding. You added water which apparently brought the cold coolant up to an acceptable level, to where the light would not trigger when cold.

The question is where did your previous coolant go? You may want to look for leaks in your coolant system; hoses, coolant tank, water pump, tank cap.

The coolant needle just measures the coolant temperature at any given moment. It will start on the left when the motor is cold and move to the middle when the engine has warmed up.

If all you added was a couple of cups of water, you have likely not lost enough anti-freeze to make any difference.

Lessons about cooling systems, all learned the hard way.

Distilled water boils off at normal operating temperatures. Check the level frequently.

(This applies to 2006 and earlier. Not sure about 2007.) Check the part number on your radiator cap. It should end in a "4". If it ends in "1", replace it. If it runs hot, it will eventually dump a couple gallons of coolant all over everything. One gallon of coolant costs more than the new radiator cap.

There is a valve that pressurizes the cooling system, that may be defective. This will also cause overheating, and dumping of coolant, even with the proper radiator cap.