Coolant level

[mpaulson]

On both the truck in the signature below and on my 2014 3500 welding truck with the same drive line as the on below, I had the low coolant warning light come on at start up with both trucks in the past month and needed to top up the coolant. Is this normal? Should one expect a little evaporation going on over time and need to top it up?? Absolutely no leaks that are making themselves visible. No discolouration of oil etc. In both cases I've topped them up with the OAT coolant and they have been fine.
Just wondering if this is normal.

 

[zetatre]

In all my experience with cars I've convinced myself many many times that evaporation was the cause only to later find a pesky leak either hidden by some panel somewhere or just so slow that it wouldn't show.

Keep an eye on the waterpump: I was recently reading around of a slow leak from the weep hole. Inspect it closely.

And another often culprit of slow leaks: I've never seen the radiator used in our trucks, but often time you have an aluminum core with plastic caps at both ends. With time they develop small leaks between the plastic and the aluminum.

If you want to go the extra mile, there's certain dies you add to the coolant that show leaks with the help of a black-light.

Unless you have a programmer, I wouldn't even consider the HG.

Sometime, on new cars you do notice an occasional decline in coolant at the beginning that is justified by the swelling of rubber hoses. But that something that settles after not to long.

 

[Steve Martin]

Had this happen to my truck as well. I was told that on occasion when the truck has ran for a few thousand miles when new the truck could “burp” a little air out of the system. I was on a trip in Oregon and was in a small town when my light came one, couldn’t get the factory coolant. Called the dealer and was told to just top off with a little distilled water and should be good. It took about 1 1/2 cups...If that...That was 15,000 miles ago and haven’t had to add another drop.

Steve

 

[mpaulson]

When I get home I'll snoop around better and check the pump. Odd that both the 2014's that I have did the same thing close together. I'm on a 7000km spring break road trip right now.
Thanks for the replies.

 

[Jonsnow]

Mine gives a low coolant warning occasionally when it's sat over night and it very cold out. It will be a little low so I was topping it off only to see it was overfull when it warmed up. I no longer fill when it's cold. No more issues.

 

[Dieselnerd]

Mine was slightly low after about 2000 miles. I added a little distilled water.

Now after a couple of years and 22,000 miles the level has not changed at all.

 

[mpaulson]

I've got 78,000kms on mine and 40,000kms on the other one before it showed up. Same thing though, only for the initial start up when around the freezing mark. I couldn't really see any markings on the reservoir for full hot/cold. I added about 1.75 litres. A few thousand kms since and it's fine and hasn't puked any out either if I did overfill it.