I had been putting up with a slow but steady coolant leak from somewhere under the inlet manifold since the engine had been put back in at the start of the summer, and decided to get it sorted. I'd already established by peering down between the branches of the inlet that the leak had to be coming from the hard coolant pipe that runs along the side of the block down there. I was hoping it was a dodgy connection to a hose but figured worst case it could be a cracked pipe, maybe damaged whilst the engine was re-installed...
So I whipped off the inlet manifold - third time of doing that now so quite a quick job for me now!
Once it was off I could feel that the drip was indeed coming from where the heater matrix return hose is clamped onto the hard pipe. Once coolant was drained out and the hose was off it was pretty obvious that the jubilee used was just too big for the hose diameter... Frustrating but a very easy fix.
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As one seems to do with these kind of things, I thought that whilst I was in there with the manifold off, I might as well take a look at the starter motor, as it had been making the classic horrible grinding noise when turning the key every so often. It's near impossible (certainly without a lift) to get the starter off an E36 without removing the inlet manifold, so it seemed like the sensible thing to do! One thing always leads to another...
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Red shows the hard pipe where the return hose was dripping. Orange shows the solenoid which is attached to the starter that is below it. Blue shows the heater supply pipe from the head that I split when clumsily accessing the starter bolts... Grr.
Those starter bolts are a right pain! E12 head on them, which faces the rear of the car as bolted through the tranmission bell housing from back to front. The only way I could get to them was to construct a ridiculous length of socket extension, using every single 3/8ths piece that I had! They also required a lot of to and fro from above to below the car to try and get socket and extensions all lined up around the side of the transmission...
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So here's it with the starter removed - the empty bolt holes for the starter are those that line up with the flywheel's circumference in the picture.
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The starter and solenoid work fine in isolation direct from the battery, so I think that the solenoid is probably a bit sticky which is causing an intermittent grinding but starting fine most of the time. A new solenoid is only £20, so that and a new hose to replace the split one, and of course a new jubilee clip of the correct diameter range (28 - 33mm fact fans!), are currently on their way to me.
With the battery disconnected to work on the starter, I've not tried to diagnose my non-functioning heater blower yet, but that's next on the list. Google says the Final Stage Resistor is the most likely culprit after a cursory check of fuses and relays.
