Well intentioned Mistakes

[jb92563]

Got a bit of a scare on Monday at work when a fellow coworker mentioned a fluid trail in the parking lot leading under my Boxster.
I went out to discover I had apparently left a nice coolant trail the last 50' of my drive leading to the passenger rear right under the coolant reservoir.

There was a more substantial dump under the car, so perhaps a cup or two of coolant all together.

I immediately reflected back to the prior weekend when I had done an oil and filter change.
The car had its rear up on jack-stands and after I had refilled the oil I noticed the Coolant tank was nearly empty so I topped it up.
Then I took the car off the stands and topped up the oil to the proper final level.

Did you spot my mistake yet?

So back to monday at work, I checked the coolant level after work to decide whether I should attempt to drive home(15 miles) or flatbed it.
The Coolant tank was half full cold. Interesting!
I drove it home with a sharp eye to the temp and the road for any signs of further leakage....no issues.

I let it idle in the driveway till the rad and engine fans had all cycled and also cycled the heat so I knew the system still had coolant.
Stopped the engine and very SLOWLY opened the coolant cap. Pressure escaped indicating that I had a good seal on the cap even though it was an original -01 version of cap.
The pressure also confirmed that there were no holes or leaks in the cooling system as not a drop was released on the garage floor.

Essentially the initial pressure test was a good sign as I expected the water pump, a hose, or the cap to be leaking.
Interestingly the coolant level hot was nearly at the top of the tank and went down as the engine started to cool.

Then it occurred to me that those 2 extra cups of coolant that dumped at work were probably due to me adding too much coolant while up on the jack stands.
Hence coolant EXPANSION tank had lived up to its name and when there is no more room for expansion the cap or over pressure valve had to release the excess coolant.

I still need to follow pedros procedure for getting air bubbles out of the cooling system just to be extra safe, so the car will remain in the garage till the weekend.
(Darn, going to miss the Auto-X in San Diego this weekend)

So lesson learned, don't adjust coolant fluid level when the car is not level.....duh!
At least I had better sense with the oil level.

Just to be safe I ordered a water pump because at 71k miles it is still on the original and a new -04 coolant cap since the -01 are known to be trouble on occasion, and since I'm going to be wrenching in that area I added the 160F thermostat and a Tarret 4" Under drive Pulley w/belt.

Every mistake is an opportunity for upgrades