Hey all,
l'd like to say is, I bought a new battery and alternator seems fine, and I have new*plug*wires. It all started when my brother put it in reverse from a coast. It died. Now it needs a jump overtime. I noticed when i*take*it*off the jumper cables, it revs real high. Now the car wont stay running at all. You jump it, and it stays running. Idles ok. Then after a while, it decides to slowly drop idle, and die. If i put it in drive, it slowly dies. Looking under the hood when it was running i noticed I have*radiator*fluid*leaking out of a gasket my alternator. Could the leak be the case of the car dying? Now my car is sitting at work, and I need to figure this out.

 

If you have coolant leaking out of the block, you may have a cracked block. If the car slowly dies while it is running, you may have a bad fuel pump or some other issue. I assume you have a 940, or 740, or 240??? Is the car turbo?

A car needs 5 things to run...
1. Compression
2. Spark
3. Good fuel pressure
4. Timing
5. Air

Just a note, I'm pretty sure Volvo alternators do not have coolant running through them.

 

lol. l meant next to my alternator. as in location. i have a 244. it isnt turbo

 

is this coolant leaking out of

A) the head-block interface?
B) the water pump?
C) the side of the block where the freeze plugs are?

clean up the engine and let it thoroughly dry before starting if you can't tell, and watch closely to see where its coming from.


re: all your electric problems, a volt meter would be useful. measure the battery voltage before trying to start the car, it should be about 12.6V if its fully charged... if its below 12V, you need to charge the battery first. when the car is started and running, the voltage should be about 1 volt higher, indicating the alternator is working and recharging the battery.

 

ah. i noticed the leak is water pump. and there is a draw on the battery. so now how do i find the source of the battery draw?

 

how did you detect/measure this draw on the battery?

if you did it via an amp meter (the only way I'd trust), I'd separate out the 3-4 wires at the battery +, and see if the draw is via a specific one of them. then follow whatever current drain to the source. you could try removing each fuse one by one, and seeing which fuse is the drain.

if you want more specific help after you've tested some of this, you'll need to tell us the year too, so I can look at the right year's wiring diagram (there's a rather major bunch of differences between a early 1970's 240 and a 1990's final version, for instance)

 

well my dad tested it in a meter. my year is 84. also when we were out there, i pulled the fuses in the car,one by one, and still had a drain.

 

how big a drain was this? 20 or 50 milliamps or so is well within reason

 

i have to check. i know it was a new battery and after one night, its drained. ok. so the leak isnt causing the car to die? and the drain isnt making the car die? would i be the fuel pump then?

 

well, coolant blooshed all over the alternator is probably not a good thing, it could be causing electrical leakagee.

 

The English in this thread is painful to read. Not that I'm one to talk, I know I make plenty of typos.

Anytime I suspect an alternator, I hook up a voltmeter to the battery and see what's going on. So if you jump it and it's starts at 12.5 volts and drops as soon as you pull he cables down to like 11.5V, you know the alternator is not charging. If it starts up and gets up to around 14V it's charging. If it's not charging and that's what is killing it, you can keep the meter on the battery until it dies and watch the voltage decrease and decrease until it dies. That will tell you exactly if it is a charging issue.

If battery voltage if fine, then I would try cleaning the throttle body of some other mechanical problem. The first thing I would do is confirm whether or not lack of electrical power is the cause or not.

Also when you jump start a car, do not have the car with the good battery running. I have seen many people kill perfectly fine alternators running the good car's charging system into the dead car's. Just use the battery in the good car to help the other and disconnect as soon as possible. I always charge using a battery charger if I can afford to.