I kept topping off the water in the radiator each day but the leak got steadily worse. I asked around and had a mechanic highly recommended to me; however, I did not have enough money at the time and had to wait till payday which was several days away. I started keeping extra water in the back of the van just in case and I made an appointment to fix the radiator on payday. Then, on the way home, the leak suddenly became much worse and would hardly hold any water. I had to stop several times on the way home and fill it up to keep the engine from overheating. There was a steady stream of water coming out of the radiator. I used up all my backup water in the van and barely made it home. We only have one vehicle so there was not a second car I could use. Payday was three days away so we were grounded for three days. I called in at work and worked as much as possible from my computer at home. However, there were two problems. I had a doctors appointment the next day that I absolutely could not miss. And, I had to somehow get the van to the mechanic which was many miles away on the other side of town.
I had heard about an old trick for leaky radiators, cracking an egg into the radiator, and looked it up online. There is a lot of debate surrounding this (see here and here); some people say it might work and some say absolutely not. So I tried it. Actually I had T crack an egg into the radiator with a lot of water. He thought I was nuts. I started it up and let the engine run for a while. The theory is as the water in the radiator heats up the egg cooks and solidifies and seals the leak. We tried driving down the road a short way and back and it seemed to work almost immediately. The radiator was holding water and the engine was not overheating. We popped the hood and there was a faint cooked egg smell. The egg worked perfectly for the next few days. I was able to drive to the doc appointment, and to the mechanic. Finally on payday I had the radiator replaced and the system flushed out.
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