Hey guys. I've been living in the bay area for about a year now and im trying to look for a reliable mechanic that could do some work on my car.

Long story short...i have an '05 6mt with MREV that i installed a couple months back. It was time for an oil change so i went to Frontier Infiniti by Santana Row earlier today. They told me that coolant was leaking somewhere from the engine bay and said that it should be looked at and taken care of (with a small price, of course). So they end up finding that the coolant was leaking from the hose that connects to the spacer inbetween the throttle body and the upper intake plenum (collector). Now they are saying i need a new upper plenum + other crap that added up to almost $1000 with labor. This is definitely not necessary so I need to find an infiniti specialist that could hopefully do this for less.

On top of all that..i don't even think that the upper plenum has anything to do with a coolant leak from a hose. right?! Also, i was wondering if anyone in the area has installed MREV on their G and could maybe help me out and take a look at it.

So if anyone knows any good shops in the area...please let me know. Thanks a lot guys.

 

Coolant leak? Based on what I read, you installed a Copper Heating plate. This is copper plate, which is located between the TB and plenum neck, as you have stated. If this is the case, I don't understand why a new upper collector is required. The way I see it, either the existing coolant lines are damaged or the copper tubing soldered to the copper plate is damaged. The fix should be either replace the existing coolant hoses or replace the Copper Heating Plate assembly.

Did you perform the MREV install? Simply remove the intake tube and the Throttle Body, at a minimum, and you should be able to inspect the damage. Worst case scenario, you will need to remove the upper collector for a closer look. When using the Copper Heating Plate, the upper collector's coolant supply and return openings are abandoned and of no use.

 

dirkchokurate,



Is this the piece that was installed? This is the Copper Heating Plate, which is installed and located, as previously mentioned.

 

Ditto on Andy's analysis. There's no reason to replace the upper plenum if there is a leak since the coolant line on the plenum isn't used anymore (if you installed the copper plate).

Albert Rios at Frontier Infiniti is a cool guy, you should have talked to him about what the problem is and how they can help you.

Otherwise, I can recommend you to go to Yarnell's in mountain view. Their guys specialize in Toyota and Nissan so they are familiar with the VQ. They did my header install for me.

 

Thanks you guys for the very helpful input. Yes, this is the piece that was installed and the leak, it turns out, was coming from the coolant hose that was attached to this copper heating plate.

As for the fix, i went to a shop that a friend recommended and they simply replaced this piece with an oem gasket and now no leak so far, so good. This fix cost me a total of 90 bucks with labor! Now this compared to the $900 the dealer was asking for! Amazing what the stealerships will go through, just to make an extra buck.

Thanks again for the responses and Andy, i have another question for you. So now that the copper heating plate has been replaced with the oem plate, will this have a significant negative effect on the MREV product? I have the MREV+ still on my car, but now just w/o the copper heating plate.

 

Great! I am pleased to read that you did not get taken advantage of for such a minor fix . . . Good for you.

Assuming that the 2 existing coolant lines were reconnected to their normal points of connection at the neck of the upper plenum, which I am positive is the case because you have no visible leaks . . . The air entering the plenum will just be warmer, as it was prior to the copper plate installation. That in itself will not have any ill effects on your MREV+ set-up.