For the last few days, whenever I drive my car and then get out, I can smell a burning smell from the front of the car. It's near the front grille area, near the radiator. I first suspected it was a burning plastic bag, but there's not anything under the car.

The smell can rarely be smelled from inside the car, but as soon as you get out of the car you can smell it strongly from the front. No weird noises, no leaks, no loss of power and no loss of any function like heat, radio, etc.


Does this sound like a bad electrical component, or maybe a bad radiator fan or something? I'm trying to pinpoint it, but I work until after dark tonight and can't check it out then.

 

Have you bothered to look under the hood and try to track it down?

 

Yeah, I looked under the hood for several minutes. Nothing at all is out of the ordinary, except for the smell.

 

Can you describe the smell??? burning plastic, radiator fluid, oil??? Need more info in order to help!

 

It smells like a mix of burning plastic and burning electrical wires or something. It's definitely not coolant or oil, 100%.

 

Perhaps your radiator has a slow leak and the coolant is shorting out the fan wires.
Happened to me a while back
XP