Coolant smell in passenger compartment?

heater hose or core leaking? you should take the black plastic cover off the radiator, and check the level under the cap, when it's cold! and use toyota coolant if it needs topping up. maybe in the morning it was providing some heat and in the heat of the day, not. after you top up the coolant, take it for a ride with the heat on to see if you get the smell.

 

If you have an external coolant leak under the hood, the Toyota Long Life Coolant (LLC) that leaks out will turn into a reflective pink foam or splatter and be very easy to spot with a light. Look at all the hoses, fittings, water pump, anywhere a leak can occur. If you add coolant, use only Toyota LLC.

 

If this is one of the few times you've used the climate control WITHOUT AC, you probably just realized how nasty the smell is that comes out of your vents. Some say it smells like coolant, I would say it's a moldy stale smell.

Either way, if you can turn you AC on and not smell anything strange......then it's just your climate control. Maybe some maintenance is in order for that!

 

That doesn't sound like unusual loss. On ours, the level of both reservoirs was at-or-near the bottom line, a little over 50,000 kilometers on odometer. April 03 I topped them up to the top lines, with the specified (pre-mixed with water) coolant, and it's held there since. I'd expect in another 4 years will have to do it again.

 

Without prior knowledge of coolant levels it's hard to say if you have a leak. Could have been someone else on the road that had a catastrophic cooling system failure and the evidence still has an odor. Leaking Toyota coolant leaves a characteristic pink deposit, easy to see. Top up both coolant tanks and observe over time. And sorry Bisco, I don't think there is a radiator cap per se on the US Gen III. I'm pretty sure on my car the overflow hose goes directly to the tank. Maybe the little cap on the tank acts as the pressure control cap.

 

no prolemo. i think when you take the black plastic cover off, there's some kind of cap to check the coolant in the radiator. pretty sure you can't trust the tanks for low coolant.

 

^ I was totally in agreement, pulled the trim panel off to check, and: DOESN'T appear to a radiator cap.

 

Ummm ... Have you guys noticed there's a pressure rating marked on the caps on those coolant reservoirs? It serves almost the same purpose as a conventional radiator cap, which you don't have. The difference is that the reservoir is pressurized, unlike the earlier kind of coolant-recovery tanks.

 

The reason I know there isn't a cap on the radiator is because of a repair I made shortly after taking delivery of my car. I noticed that the radiator fan frame wasn't attached properly at one end. The vehicle maintenance record said there was an air conditioning problem addressed by the dealer some 18 months prior. That fan frame had been loose for that long. To get it back in there I had to do some extensive disassembly, even removing the top front cross member that extends over the radiator. Got up close and personal with the cooling system. Still, I don't recall if the radiator is portioned up like the Gen II where top 2/3 is for the ICE and the bottom 1/3 is for the inverter. Someone must know.

 

Inverter radiator is at the top on gen 3. Starting to make sense, there not being a conventional radiator cap.

And yeah, I topped up both reservoirs a few months back, noticed the caps are really tight seal.

 

i guess pat wongs advice is for gen II only?

 

"pat songs"? IPhone autocorrect or summit?

 

dang.

 

Yeah just took a look at Repair Manual section on coolant change, no filler cap atop radiator. I wonder if that's part of the issue, getting air out of the system.

My son and I just changed the coolant on his (was ours) 06 Civic. You pour coolant in at the rad cap, with the air bleed valve open. When coolant starts coming out of the air bleed valve, steady, you tighten it up, keep pouring 'till coolant is up to the neck. Then you just start up the car, let it run 'till the cooling fan comes on twice. You stand at the front monitoring the radiator neck: the coolant will sometimes gurgle up, and you baste it off. Then it'll drop, you add some. Occasionally squeeze the hoses, to possibly burp air out. Fan cycles on twice, you shut down, put the rad cap on, done.

 

Is that Repair Manual available through the Toyota TIS (Technical Information Site) site? A person must purchase a period of time there to access the information, or perhaps make copies of the information available there for later reference. I sure wish Haynes would do a Gen III manual. Yeah, I know, cheesy Haynes manuals. I've been using them for years without a problem. I have seen evidence of an updated Toyota Prius manual that applies to Gen I to III, but can't seem to locate one for purchase. I'll have to look around again, maybe something is available now. I'm pretty hip to any removal/replacement tasks on my Prius, but it sure would be nice to have a detailed procedure. Especially all the various tightening torques.