I never noticed the coolant cap had two tiny hoses on it. One of them is real short and connects to nothing. The other day when I refilled my coolant I noticed it but didnt think much of it. Same night after I topped off coolant I notice smoke coming out of my hood. Popped my hood and sure enough there was some coolant that sprayed out of that tiny hose... What gives? the last few nights its been fine, nothing leaking from what I can see. Is this smaller tube just an overflow or outlet tube for spill over?

 

Will pictures help?

 

This little hose is what I am talking about. As you can see in the background it has shot out some coolant after I topped it off. Is this just an overflow cable to prevent the cap from blowing?

 

why does your cap have two outlets?

 

mines the same way. i think its an overflow

 

It's to spill out any overflow, and it's very common that the coolant does what yours did. Mine is all crusty from when it spilled out too. There's a few threads on it, I think some people said the dealer has a fix for it but I've never cared enough to look into it. Nothing to worry about if you ask me

 

Looks like we all agree. Thanks guys!

 

i brought it up to the dealer last time i was there, they said it's normal on the 2IS oh well, as long as it's not leaking, i'm not gonna worry about it too much.

 

How high did you fill the rez in order to have the excess fill out through that tube? I've always had mine on the max fill level, and besides the "coolant crust" around the cap I've never seen any amount spill out of the tube.

 

it's for the overflow...Because your coolant is in your cooling system when then engine is cold, then when it heats up and expands it goes to the reservoir...then when your engine cools back down, the pressure subsides and thus it sucks up the coolant from the reservoir again. But sometimes there is just a little too much on the reservoir that it needs to go somewhere (hence the extra tube)

hope this helps...i just read it again and even i got confused! LOL