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2001 Catera coolant leak

912 views 7 replies 3 participants last post by  retho78 
#1 ·
How's it going everyone? I hope you all are doing well and staying safe with the current crisis.

It's been a very long time since I have been here. My current issue is with a 2001 Catera that's leaking coolant from the oil cooler cover. Initially I thought it was coming from the water pump location so, pulled the timing cover off and it was nice and dry. Then pulled the upper/lower intake off and found the leak coming from the oil cooler location. Just from looking at it without taking the oil cooler out, there is no oil mixing with the coolant so, my thought is it's the seals between the oil cooler and oil cooler cover is bad. I did a search online and the part# came up as (Oil cooler seal 90409175).

My question is should I change the oil cooler or just the seals? I know the oil cooler is pricey and my other concern just swapping out the seals may not fix the leak.

Thanks in advance!
 
#3 ·
Thanks. I used to own 1998 Catera and had to replace the oil cooler and that was due to oil & coolant mix, and in this case I am only seeing coolant leak and no oil residue. I am going to pull the oil cooler cover and see if there's any mix going on and check the oil cooler as well.
 
#4 ·
I took the oil cooler cover off and not seeing any oil mixing in but there's a lot corrosion on the cover/plate. I can't tell for sure now if the leak is from a bad seal or the cover. I am thinking to get a new oil cooler kit with a new cover and call it good, and not to worry about it leaking again after putting everything back.
 
#5 ·
Hi Retho 78, I just did same job few days ago. There is no gaskets under the cooler cover, you have to use silicone there. There are two O rings I used for cooler seal, under each oil port, where two big nuts, there you hook your oil lines. I used general O rings, I can't tell you exact size, but I have blue box, I believe from Harbor freight, just match the size. Also I highly recommend you to replace thermostat or gasket. I had sipping from there too, nothing drastic, I had to pressurize the system to verify the leak, it was very slow one, but annoying. Easier to replace whole thing with housing. Might be tricky to pull out thermostat extension pipe, depends on your case. Mine came off easily. Replace O rings there as well, same blue box, just find the working size. I used smaller ones, but when streched, worked flawlessly. And to ease the process of cooler removal, remove the oil filter housing (T12 Hex socket, remove the bolt, located right inside of the housing, you can see it when removing cover and filter), and loose oil lines, not nessesary pull them out, just take them out of way. It will speed up your process, don't bent lines too much, or you end up with fitting headache. That's about it.
Most likely you gonna damage coolant's bridge fancy washers with integrated rubber seals. I ended up using older Metal rings/washers, removing old material and installing new o rings instead. If you can buy anywhere new ones, good for you, but there is solution as I just described, no leaks so far, just make sure you allighn them properly. Even if not, it's not a very big deal redo it later.
Good luck.

Sent from my Pixel 3a using Tapatalk
 
#6 ·
Yes, ordered the oil cooler set from Amazon and the cheapest I have found but, have to wait few days due to the current CO-VID19 crisis. I ordered the special washers (ACDelco 12992647) for the crossover bridge and have them with me. Also, replacing the flat washers (GM 11076852) for the oil cooler lines which is a special order. I removed the oil cooler without loosening the lines from the oil filter area, just push the lines back a little and insert the socket to loosen the oil cooler nuts and have done this before on my 1998 Catera. Regarding the thermostat I am not messing with it, as it was replaced about 2 or 3 years ago when I did the timing belt replacement.

Also, had to send in the ABS module for repair, which is back now and will be installing it this weekend.
 
#8 ·
Update - replaced the thermostat, oil cooler and ABS module and it fired up. Everything seems to be working so far and the only issue now is an annoying fuel related problem. I will search the forum first for answers, if not will start a new thread regarding this strange problem.
 
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