HELP!!!!!!!

1991vert

10 Year Member
Feb 27, 2004
1,103
7
69
Ludlow, MA
well i punctured a small hole in one of my radiator cross tubes trying to force a clip on for the fan shroud. the hole is really small, like pin size i didnt even notice it until after i put everything back together and went to fill the car. i then had a puddle at the base of my feet. i filled the hole with some high-temp silicone, the red stuff that people sometimes use on their lower intake to sides of lifter valley instead of the cork.

think that this will do the trick? or do you think there will be too much pressure and force the "seal" that i made right out? i globbed it on there pretty good.
 
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The silicone will definitely get pushed out when your car gets up to operating temperature. You should pull the radiator and bring it to a shop to get repaired. If you are feeling really cheap, a little JB Weld would probably fix it for a while.
 
wouldn't it be possible to solder over the aluminum radiator as well? Copper would be cake, but I'm not certain on the Al. one. JB weld is some amazing stuff, it held my friends tailpipe on for over a year, even with a ton of vibration.
 
Aluminum doesn't solder at all, and is very difficult to try to weld with anything but a heliarc machine.

I have fixed a number of copper radiators by peeling away the fins around the leak and soldering them with a propane torch. It was very nasty looking when I finished, but it didn't leak. In extreme cases, I have cut the tubes at the tank, folded them over and soldered them shut. That was a little better looking, but not much.

As previously metioned, drain the radiator prior to trying to solder the leak.
 
got some J.B. weld and plugged the hole. there was a small puncture in one of the cross tubes due to my impatience lol. i'll prolly buy some of that stop leak stuff and pour it in afterwards. btw: it's aluminum.