I'm generally against using any such "repair in a can" type of solutions and prefer to actually fix a problem correctly.

HOWEVER, I'm in a tight spot right now not having any actual income (or a job....yet) and have a pretty nasty leak in my rad.

I FINALLY found it by accident, located on the bottom and the coolant is being sucked/blown all over my fan shroud, and everything else behind the fan.

Are there any decent products I can use to seal the leak until such time as I locate gainful employment and can actually fix it??

Aside from the leak it's also running the wrong coolant, the PO was obviously an idiot or took it to an idiot and they put the regular green coolant in.

 

I'd look into the Blue Devil line of products if you absolutely must. They're designed to have no solid particulate in them and rely on a chemical reaction with air to harden the mix at the leak source.

Though anything you put in there will, unfortunately, cause buildup elsewhere in the system.

Try an egg. It's natural!

 

I've heard the egg thing, but I'm wondering how well it would actually work.

I just checked out blue devils website, and the closest thing they have is head gasket sealer, which they mention works on heater cores, so I guess it could work on a rad too.

I wonder if it would flush out with cleaning chemicals once I can fix the problem though.

 

Well I picked up a bottle of rislone liquid copper.... not sure why I chose that over the liquid aluminum but they have the same instructions, and it seems that most of these products are ALL the same.

I would have went with blue devil but that stuff is like $75 and I just can't afford that right now.

What's interesting to me about these Rislone products is that they all say to "leave in the cooling system..." which indicates to me that this stuff can be flushed out.....

I guess I'll find out. I'll report back the results when I use it.

EDIT

Now I'm just considering taking it back, I've been reading stuff about heater cores not working so well after using it, and that it should be flushed a week after use etc......
Looks liked I'm boned either way lol.

Blue Devil is not available in Canada.

 

Is it cold there? Take a pair of vice grips and some extra rubber hose and pinch off the feeder line to the heatercore if you don't want anything getting in there.

A local rad shop might be able to braze on a patch for you for cheap. It's worth a shot if you've got no other options.

 

not a bad idea pinching off the heater core....amazing the simple things that I overlook in lieu of a more complicated solution

I'm going to return the bottle of stop leak, and instead I bought some "wet seal" epoxy putty. The rad is leaking right at the bottom, where the plastic is clamped to the aluminum.

I should be able to dry it off, and mash the putty all around it hopefully offering me a decent fix. I've seen this stuff work on gas tanks, but those aren't pressurized, although this stuff is supposed to work on copper pipes too, and water lines are pressurized to 60 PSI.

I was going to do it today but it's WAY to cold to be doing this today...it's like -18*C and windy to boot, so feels like -28

 

Sell your body to some big girls, and buy yourself a new Radiator......

Let us know if that stuff fixes your leak....