The Fit is primarily my wife's car. I drove it this morning to get her some gas and to run a few errands. Within ten seconds after cold startup (outside temp about 28 degrees), there is a sound of fluids rushing about emanating from the dash area. Judging by the pitch, it sounds like coolant not anything thicker such as a lubricant or hydraulic fluid. Is this a normal sound? Coolant level is normal

Thanks

 

Sounds like you need to bleed the coolant of air. It's a really simple procedure but I don't know it from memory, there's a service bulletin for it around somewhere.

 

It must be some air in the coolant system, but it might be more difficult to get rid of it than I originally thought.
I've had the exact same problem for about a year. It started after I got my block heater installed a year ago at the Honda dealership in Brampton, Ontario. I took it there back twice and they told me that's a normal sound even if I insisted that they had to bleed the engine. After that I took it to another Honda dealership (Lakeshore Honda in Toronto) where they bled the engine. I had to take it back after that again, but then they seemed to bleed it properly. However I started noticing this fluid sound again last December and even better I realized that my block heater stopped working. So I took it back to the dealership in Brampton where they replaced the block heater. I told them to please bleed the engine properly this time, but of course they didn't. So I took it back again, and they bled it again. But I still have this sound of running fluid when the engine is running. Usually it's happening when I start the engine after the block heater was on. If I start it with a cold engine I don't hear it until I go down on a slope, or stop the car. Then all of a sudden I hear the fluid move and then this sound won't go away. I'm getting now really pissed off why they can't bleed the engine properly. I thought it was an easy procedure but now it looks like it's a rocket science for "Honda trained technicians".

 

it's not that hard to do. just top off your filler to the neck (check your owner's manual, should be a diagram there) and your reserve to the max, race the engine at 3K-4K rpm for 10 seconds, repeat like 10x keeping an eye on the water temp indicator making sure you dont over heat. it wont over heat unless your coolant is leaking tremendously.

then just let the engine cool for 25-30min, open the radiator, refill if necessary, refill the reserve, repeat. just make sure your engine is cool before opening the radiator cap as it will burn you with steam!

detomaso- in your case, it sounds like a blotched install... you probably have a leak somewhere.

 

Well, I'm taking my car back to the dealership in Brampton again with a little hope that they'll bleed the engine, or if there's a leak then they find it and fix it. It is very likely though that I'll have to bleed the engine myself.
Kenchan, thanks for the instruction!

 

Thank you Kenchan, I will try that procedure. Does it matter that as soon as I back out of the garage, I head forward down our driveway which is a relatively steep slope? I'll have to recheck to see if the sound is reproduced after a cold start on a level surface