Hello all. I am new to the forum. I recently had my first major issue with my ecodiesel and felt like I should share it with you all. Maybe some of you have experienced the same thing. So at 72k miles my engine decided to spring a major coolant leak. I first noticed the leak when backing into my driveway, noticed a trail of water. I jumped out of my truck to investigate. Water was running from the back of the motor and down the trans bellhousing. By the time I shut the truck off there was almost no coolant left in the motor. I'm lucky it happened when it did. I spent a few hours trying to diagnose where the coolant was coming from. With no avail I chose to have to have it towed to the nearest dealer. It took the mech a few days to diagnose what failed and allowed me to come to the shop to check it out. As some of you may know there is a coolant line that is in the valley of the motor that comes from the drivers side head and feeds to the turbo or formally called the turbo water feed tube. This tube is made up of two hard lines that are connected by a rubber heater hose. The heater hose split! To access this absolutely terrible engineering design the intake manifold had to be removed. Now why would they put a standard heater hose in one of the most hottest parts of the motor? I understand they need flex but they could have used something of better quality, maybe something that could withstand heat better like a silicon hose or designed the hose to run on the outside of the motor. Best part yet fca declined a warranty claim because it's considered rubber it is not covered under warranty past 36k miles. 2 weeks and $2100 later I finally got my truck back. I wrote this to give a heads up to the ecodiesel community of what could happen to you and what to expect. during this whole dilemma I couldn't find anyone that has experienced the same failure. No aftermarket manufacturers or shops that I contacted heard of this or make a bulletproof kit yet. I live in az. summers are hot and I tow. What do they think will happen to rubber over time in those type of conditions? Maybe my environmental conditions cause the failure sooner then others. I was able to keep the old part. How is this part not covered by warranty when you can't maintain this part that is in the valley of the motor without tearing the motor apart to replace it? The rubber hose is dry and brittle. I cant imagine that i am the only eco that has had this happen. Let me know if you have had this happen. Maybe we can ban together and open a class action agenst fca for this poor engineering design. Let me know your thoughts. Thanks.
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