My buddy has an 86 Iroc with the 305. Today we were driving it and when we pulled it into his garage I thought I smelled coolant. I popped the hood and couldn't see anything. Then I walked around the back of the car and seen that there was a line of coolant where we had just pulled in. I looked under the car and there was a steady stream of coolant leaking from just in front of his transmission pan. I jacked it up with a little jack he had, but couldn't get it high enough in the air to see under it. Also I know nothing about the location of things on the 3rd gens. Therefore I'm not even sure where I should be looking for the leak to be coming from. Any ideas where I should look when he brings it over? Also the radiator was full and the overfill tank was fine. Is it possible that it was just over filled? If so where would it be leaking from. Thanks for any info.

 

The farthest you can go back on a third gen's cooling system is the heater core, but if it was leaking you should have noticed a wet carpet, especially with it "streaming" out.
I would say that if it was streaming down just in front of the tranny pan, it would be in either the input or output hose connection of the heater core.
If the hose was leaking at these points, the coolant could be running down the firewall, and I would say that that would put the puddle point pretty well right in front of the tranny.
Just follow the two coolant hoses that run perpindicular to each other over the passenger side valve cover, and they will both go in to the firewall, this is most likely the point of the issue.

 

Thanks alot. Now that you mention it, I can't believe I didn't think of the heatercore myself. Once again thanks for the help.