Hey, pulled up into my driveway and switched off the engine, only to see smoke from the drivers side in the engine bay. There's a coolant leak on the floor, looks like it's come from the drivers side of the engine at the rear, i'm guessing it's the turbo coolant hose but i cant see without another jack. I've shone a blacklight torch in there to try and work out where the coolant is coming from but it's too bloody hard to see. Does anyone have any pictures or anything that could help? or could you identify which hoses i should be checking in this photo? cheers, james.
If it's a standard VG without any bypass's etc, and a TT, then there are a number of hoses that you need to check. The 2 heater hoses (the big ones in that photo) there's the under plenum hoses. The hoses that run from the heater hard pipes to the turbo's, there would be 7 individual hoses at the back there, plus the under plenum hoses that could be leaking. My advice is to pull the plenum, do the bypass and replace every single hose at the back of the motor, also run a new length of hose from the passenger turbo to the nipple behind the plenum as there are a couple of hoses you can't reach to replace with the engine and box in...well it's very freaking difficult. I say this because I replaced them one at a time, and once one goes, it's pretty much a green light for the rest to go.
thanks for your reply. the under plenum hose bypasses have been done. i just quadruple checked the engine and found a vac leak on the plenum *doh*. will i need to pull the plenum to get to the hoses at the rear or the engine, or is this an engine out scenario?
not neccesarily, depends on how well you know your way around the back there. I know some people will say you need to, I personally never have.
