BWeb

My 2003 Allroad with 258K miles had the heater core (or possibly a hose passenger side of the firewall) burst.

I know this is not an easy job but does anyone have advice? It is fix myself or off to Shokan... and I would really rather not that.

G0to60

If you just burst a hose then that's a lot easier to repair. That hose should be easy to reach and replace.

If the heater core went then that is a much bigger job. You will need to pull the whole dash out to get to the heater core as it's sandwiched between the firewall and the HVAC box inside the car. I did it once on my Corrado and that took the entire weekend start to finish. The allroad is much more complicated and will likely take a full day just to get the dash out.

You should know what failed before you dig in though. If you have coolant on the inside of the car in the foot wells then your heater core likely went. If the coolant was only in the engine bay it may just be a hose.

BWeb

This is good news as there was no coollant inside the car. The puddle came from somewhere in front of the drivers position about under the cowling.

I think I will try to dig in there but there isn't an easy way to see anything. Maybe if I go in through the cowling I can see if it wes a hose?