Pink crust coolant leak?

1) you are in the gen 4 forum, are we talking your prius c?

2) idk what 'pink crust on the inverter coolant' means?

 

Pink crust and residue is evidence of the pink long life coolant leaking yes. Was your coolant low?

 

Yes a coolant leak can lead to engine overheating and unrepairable damage.

If it's just around the cap and there's no loss of coolant I'm not sure if your problem is as dramatic. I'm not familiar with the Prius c but do you think they share the same coolant? Could you have overfilled when you flushed your coolant? If it overflowed that can explain crust around the cap. It's not totally harmless you did have some pretty corrosive stuff splashing around but there may not be a leak.

 

Any shop can do it, but it is best to use Toyota's long-life coolant.

 

Could be they just spilled some when refilling. Where exactly is the pink crust; post a picture?

 

Coolant expands when hot and the tank you see under the hood is more akin to overflow. When cold it should be between the low and high lines. Likely, if you filled it to the top you just overfilled and it expanded out of the cap, leaving the residue.

From what you've described I don't think you have a leak but just had some overflow. What kind of repair is this guy suggesting anyway?

Keep an eye on your coolant. Check under the hood every drive and see if it's losing any. See if there is any more pink crust under where you normally park. If you see an overheating warning stop immediately and turn off the car. Get a tow. But I'm doubtful it'll come to that

 

Well at the age and miles of your car that's probably not a bad idea regardless. Hoses and clamps can degrade over time and since you already did a coolant flush on the other reservoir it's probably time for that one too. Its probably fine to keep driving if you haven't seen any loss end your car is still running fine.

 

What kind of clamps? Hopefully not screw type. Are the original ones rusty?? I can’t seem them failing.

One of those will be engine coolant, and the other inverter coolant. Would be good to get the repair manual procedures for both; consider a short term subscription to Toyota Tech Info?