Yes, there must be a leak, because that car (any car) would’ve been un-driveable without it.
Oh, jeez, I must have had precognition. I needed to make a “medium” trip Tuesday, about 180 miles round trip including a few stops @ the other end, and about 30 miles from home and in a very rural area, the trans started slipping, and then the trans overtemp light came on. I was thankfully able to pull off at the entrance to a very small old cemetery. (It figures, car now dead, cemetery...)
I get under car & find slight signs of leakage, but it was hard to tell from where, and, there is an existing very slow power steering fluid leak: It uses the same fluid, so, that complicates trying to find the new source. I check the trans fluid dipstick and it is dry. No hoses appear to have come loose, etc. WTH??!!
I’d dropped wifey off to work and she didn’t take a house key, so, even if she had a co-worker take her home, she couldn’t get in, get the key for our Chevy Tahoe (which she won’t drive anyway), yada yada...
Had to have daughter-san come up from school (2 hours away from site of disaster), pick up all the trans fluid I had @ home (~3-1/2 gal!) and a funnel (thank God this car has a trans fluid dipstick), then go pick up wifey, then drive to disaster site. Put in fluid, started car, fluid starts spewing out under front of car. WTH??!!
Turned off the car, check underneath, discover that the hose clamp @ the transmission cooler inlet broke! WTH??!!
The break in the clamp’s band was on the “away” side where I couldn’t see the break, and the connection to the inlet fitting still “looked” ok — but once under the pressure of the car running, fluid would spray out. By now it was late enough to be very dicey getting to an auto parts store B4 they’d close (9 pm), and I needed tools anyway, so...
We all pile in daughter-sans car and drive home. I snag some tools and both kits of small hose clamp washers that I have, and daughter-san and I drive back up to the cemetery. Wifey stays home to get some sleep, as she has to get up at 5:30 am to get ready to go to work. Install new clamp, refill tranny — all seems well. Daughter-san follows me for ~ 15 miles, then splits off to go back to school / her dorm, and I returned home - no further problems.
Whew!
At some point someone servicing the car had put on a really wimpy, likely Chinese made hose clamp, and I guess the thing just fatigued from hot / cold cycles. I’ve never seen one break like this, mid “band” on the opposite side from the area where the screw threads contact the “band” to loosen or tighten it. (I have had that contact area be damaged from tightening too much, in garden hose repair usage.)
Even better hose clamps are available, but I’m out, in the right size. Add to “be sure to pick up or order” list!
I didn’t get to sleep until almost 4 am last night, so, now my sleep schedule is messed up (again!) and the processing sounds from the silos on the other side of the road are unusually noisy. Grrrr... I ate a bowl of cereal just now, so, hopefully I get sleepy shortly, once the sugar-boo wears off.
Well, hanging out at the old 14-grave cemetery several hours was peaceful, anyway! Thank God the weather wasn’t as hot as it will be the next several days.