So the other day I hop in my truck to drive to the gas station for smokes and lottery tickets. It's a short drive so I leave the detachable face from my radio in the apartment. I hop in and start her up. Then I hear this noise of plastic rubbing or creeking, figure no biggie, have heard dashboard noises before. Kinda liek the sound of the cup holder tray in the down position and it creeks while driving.

So I take off and make a left hand turn out of the underground parking into the street when I hear this sound of water running through a pipe. Much like being in the basement and hearing the toilet flush and the water come rushing down the drainage pip. I never have heard that noise before and I was like wtf.

There is no leaks under the truck, the carpet is dry. Has anyone ever heard their heater hoses make this kind of sound in any of their vehicles? Is this a sign of bad things to come?

The rushing water sound hasnt happened since that day saturday. I checked the radiator last night and it was about 1 quart low and the reservoir was almost empty. Not sure if this was full prior to the noise or not so I cant say if it's related.

Any idears?

 

Your getting the "wooshing" sound because there is airin the cooling system.
You have a leak somewhere. Hopefully it's external. look all around the hose connections and water pump. It's possible you have a small leak in a hot area of the engine and the coolant evaporated before it drips to the ground.
You can also have an internal coolant leak (head gasket, intake manifold etc)
Check you oil level. Is it too high? Does it look like a chocolate milkshake?
That indicates coolant leaking into the crankcase. That's Very BAD!
It could also be leaking into a cylinder and be burned along with the fuel.
Pull your spark plugs and look for a fuzzy white powder on the plug tips. This can indicate burning coolant. Also look for lots of white smoke out the tail pipe as an indicator of burning coolant.

 

Mine is making the same sounds and I have concluded the heater core is bad. It has gotten so bad that I cannot turn the heat on because the stench of cooking coolant permeates the cab. I plan on replacing it this coming weekend.

 

So far I dont smell any kind of coolant smell coming from the air/heat vents inside the cab. I'll have to take a look at the other things Rabbler was talking about. Hopefully it's just a hose clamp or somethign along those lines inside the engine compartment. Thanx for the info guys.

 

Your water pump could be going bad. Mine did the same thing and the water was leaking out of the weep hole on the pump and burning off so I never knew that there was a problem until the pump went out completely.

Also, if you smell coolant and you think your core is bad, change it ASAP. I let mine go from a bad smell, to a small drip, to a little bit larger drip to a BAM! The core blew while my wife was driving into the freight yard where she worked. It was summer time and the dock guys saw what they thought was white smoke coming out of the truck and they grabbed their fire extinguishers and ran out and pull my wife out of the truck, thinking it was on fire. I'm just glad it did not blow while going down the highway.

 

Mine was doing something similiar. When I replaced the plenum gasket, I found the rearmost intake bolt(closest to the firewall) on the driver's side broken. It was leaking coolant down the backside of the block and onto the crossover pipe and it was being burned off so it left no puddle. Look at the intake bolts on the four corners and try turning them with your finger. If it was like mine, it should just come off in your hand. It was lots of fun getting that out...[:@]

 

The first step to try and fix your problem is topull your truck up on ramps, (or jack up the front end). Open your rad cap, (make sure your coolent level is good in the rad and the resovoir), take off the rad cap and let the truck run. Watch the rad for bubbles as your truck warms up. When all the air is out of the system no bubbles will appear. Hope this helps man ..GL

 

So ive poked around the engine bay the other day and didnt notice anything out of the norm. All hoses look good as well as theclamps at the ends of the hoses. Only possible area of concern might be the thermostat housing gasket. There are no visual leaks but I did notice dried white / gray residue, probably coolant that leaked and dried. Might have been there for a long time tho, dunno.

So, either that is the spot or there is another area or hose that I need to figure out where the air leak is coming from. My truck doesnt blow white smoke so its not burning it, if it does it's very faint. The truck is due for an oil change in 600 miles but I checked the oil and its the usual dirty brown color, not the nasty coolant/oil color.

I may just have to make sure the radiator is full and run her till i see no bubbles in the coolant with the cap off.