liagreenhalgh92

I have a 2004 Honda Civic EX. Just purchased it at the end of March and it has been nothing but trouble since then. It started overheating back in May, when I was 3 hours from home. I attempted to limp it home, but it just wouldn't stay cool enough to drive. I got a tow back home and replaced the thermostat. It fixed the issue for a few weeks, until it started overheating again. At this point, I checked the texture and color of the oil to see if it may be a head gasket, I checked all of my radiator hoses to ensure there were no cracks or leaks, and I removed the radiator cap and let the car get to operating temperature to see if my coolant was circulating through my radiator. Everything checked out okay. I purchased a new radiator cap in hopes that a cheap part may fix the issue. I noticed I was having to put coolant in it more often than I should have been, so I stuck a piece of cardboard under the car after it was overheating to see if I could pin point a leak. Woke up the next morning to check, and the box was completely dry. After this, I finally broke down and took it to the shop. The service advisor had informed me that there was a small pin hole in the radiator, causing me to lose coolant. I thought this was odd, as I hadn't seen any coolant on the motor or ground confirming that it was leaking. They told me they also replaced the coolant reservoir. I shrugged off my confusion and took the car with me. Later that evening, I was on my way out of town and the car began overheating yet again (this time it was because they "forgot" to put a clamp on the radiator bypass, causing my coolant to spray all over my motor). I stopped 8 times on my way home to let the car cool off. Put a clamp on the hose and figured maybe this would be the last of my overheating issues. Wrong. Since I got it back a couple weeks ago, it has overheated 3 more times, and when it's overheating, I turn on my heat to cool the engine off. When I come to a stop light or stop sign, however, I loose all heat inside the car completely and it just blows out cold air. Generally if it's a heater core, I would have a leak inside the car (from what I've been told), and the car won't overheat. The overheating is intermittent, which leans me away from it being a water pump issue (if the water pump was going bad, it would constantly be overheating). I don't think it's a head gasket either, as the car has been running just fine and I haven't noticed any discolored smoke coming from the exhaust. I thought maybe some air pockets in my system, but I would have thought the dealership would have flushed the system when they replaced the radiator. I don't know a lot about cars, but this problem literally has me stumped. The car is currently in the shop again now, and they called this morning saying they let it run for 2 hours and drove it about 45 minutes away yesterday and couldn't get it to overheat. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. This is driving me crazy. Thanks.

ezone

Head gasket.

emich

Based on what you describe it can't be anything else

astepter

hi I have a 2003 honda civic ex that keeps over heating. there are no signs of leaks. when it did over heat I opened the hood and there was white smoke and coolant coming from the radiator cap. when I changed to rad.fan switch it worked for like two days then started over heating again. the coolant keeps disappearing but no leaks as far as I can see. and the oil does NOT look milky . so far I've changed the thermostat and rad. fan switch and I had a radiator change about 9 months ago

mikey1

chances are your head gasket is blown,

how is the coolant level in your overflow bottle?

full to the top = blown head gasket

astepter

it was empty

mikey1

with the engine cold remove the rad cap, fill the rad to the top with honda blue coolant until you can not possibly put anymore in,

now fill the overflow bottle about half way between the min and max lines,

drive the car and see what happens to these levels