It's not a Proton if it doesn't leak

Last month when I sent my wife's car for it's regular engine oil change, the mechanic noted to me that the FEAD belt (Front End Accesories Drive belt, fancy name for AC belt or fan belt) was starting to crack. I felt a bit incredulous at that time because the car had not even crack 40k km, but I decided it would be unproductive to shout at a rubber belt, so I agreed to have it changed. Unfortunately, or rather, unbelievably, the mechanic couldn't get me a new belt on that day despite the car being a very popular model, I postponed it until 2 days ago.

Since I also concluded that I should get other parts of the engine bay inspected, I opted to drive 20km to a Proton car specialist called Zordaq Motorsport in Nilai, Negeri Sembilan.

Changing the FEAD belt required access throught the right wheel well, so the mechanic had to remove the right wheel and dismantled the fender lining.

As seen below, the cracking was actually quite severe.

After inspecting other parts of the engine bay, they also found oil stain under the oil pan.

My heart sank when they showed me this, as I can feel my financial health suddenly deteriorating. Luckily, they found the culprit to be just a loose rubber seal at the base of the dipstick tube. They re-sealed the tube with glue and charged me RM15 ($3.75 USD) for their troubles.

All in including the FEAD belt replacement, the final bill came to RM115 ($29 USD), way cheaper than I expected.