I got my first Volvo, a 1972 142e a little over 3 weeks ago. Since then, it has been my daily driver. I've put about 1000 miles on it both city and highway with no problems (except for a couple blown fuses and a lost idle adjust screw).

Sunday morning, I moved it from the driveway into the garage so I could do some tinkering. I looked underneath, and found a rapidly growing puddle of transmission fluid. It was streaming out of a rubber hose hanging from the driver's side of the transmission. I suspected a broken cooling line, but traced both from the radiator to the passenger side of the transmission and they are fine.

Last night, I was able to trace the hose up over the top of the transmission to where it appears to merge with the filler tube. Is the hose a vent line?

I found a thread about a similar problem here: http://brickboard.com/RWD/index.htm?id=973874 which mentions the possiblity of a leak from the vent, but then says the most likely causes of that kind of leak are overfilling and/or overheating the transmission. The fluid level was fine when checked a couple days prior, and it doesn't seem likely that it would have overheated after travelling a maximum of 30 feet.

The fluid that came out of the tranny was bright red and did not smell burnt.

Is that hose supposed to be connected to the transmission? Is it possibly as simple as re-connecting it and adding a hose clamp?

I don't know much about transmissions, but my guess is that maybe a cooling line is clogged causing pressure to build until fluid was forced out thru the vent. My tentative plan is to drain what's left of the fluid, drop the pan & look for chunks, then attempt to flush & re-fill.

Thanks in advance for tips & advice.