Help, Help advise needed - coolant change

[d172]

I've just changed my coolant, I've warmed the car up, and the coolant in the expansion tank is not dropping. I've ran it for a good 1/2 hour now.

I have this funny feeling I may not have dropped all the old coolant. The hose I undone to drop the coolant is the one on the radiator at the bottom (which is a right bast**d to get the clip undone), there is no other pipes I should have undone is there?? (I undone the pipe just in front of the thermostat, to make sure it had dropped, which it had)

Here are the steps I have taken:

1. removed expansion tank cap
2. undone hose (bottom of the radiator) and drained coolant
3. I even removed the expansion tank completly to give a good clean
4. But it all back together
5. removed bleed screw
6. filled new coolant until it came out of the bleed screw
7. screwed in bleed screw
8. ran car at 2500 rpm for 4 minutes with expansion cap off
9. hardly any coolant dropped at this point, if any
10. stop car, put expansion cap on
11. ran car for a further 20 - 25 minutes with the heater on warm, and the coolant dropped slightly.

Have I missed anything??

In total, I've probably used about 2 litres of the 5 litres

I'm really worried I've missed something, the car is cooling down i the moment, so maybe I'm just being impatiant and it will drop a bit more.

Also the car is not over heating either on the temp gauge

Any help would be much appreciated

Thanks

Darren

 

[Fred@BTM]

did the rad fan come on?

 

[d172]

No, but it did when I but the air con on.

Since I've had the car, I don't think I've ever heard the fan kick in, my I've never got it hotter enough.

How long does it take to kick in, with out the air con on??

Thanks

Darren

 

[d172]

Bump

 

[Big Bob]

?

my fan comes on at tick over at 16 degrees C ambient when stood at idle for a few mins

 

[Rob669]

Don't have the heater on. Let it get hot. The fan will come on when the needle on the temperature gauge goes above about half way, maybe some more. It takes time, just like watching a proverbial kettle boil. It should run through three cycles of the fan cutting in and then going off.
I did almost exactly what you have done and I think I used about 3 litres of Type D coolant. The only thing I did different was I also took the top radiator hose off - to flush the radiator.

 

[d172]

Cheers for the reply's

I spoke to one of the lads at Birchdown services (very helpful lads, did my cambelt - fantastic service) and I explained to them what I have done, and I've done everything right.

The problem is, everyone says you need 7 litres for a coolant change (which you do if you flush the whole system out including engine, heater matrix and other hoses).

So for people who do a coolant change by removing the bottom radiator hose only, you will just need a 5 litre bottle, and you will be lucky to get 3.5 - 4.5 (max) litres in.

I must have wasted about a £10 worth of fuel reving my car waiting for coolant to drop, and all the time it already had dropped. (I was expecting to put in 7 litres).

If I were to do a full flush I would remove the hoses (one at a time) runing into the engine and heater matrix and flush it with water first, wait until the clear water come out of the radiator hose, then run the coolant through until it run out of the hose till it become green again, then you know the new coolant has ran through the engine and heater matrix. (if you did it this way, you would need more than 7 litres, because you will probably waste allot)

Someone might correct me on this, but I believe this is the right way for a full flush.

Thanks

Darren

 

[Aluco]

test to make sure your fan works or it could end up melting like mine. Then you overheat and break down somewhere inconvenient

 

[d172]

test to make sure your fan works or it could end up melting like mine. Then you overheat and break down somewhere inconvenient

Hi mate, yes the fan works, it kept switching on and off in intervals (another problem was for me, I was expecting the fan to be quite loud when it kicked in, but it was very quite, so I had to keep looking at the fan), and the temp gauge just sits a little over the half way mark, like it did before I did the coolant change.

All the aircon works great, really cold on cold, and really hot on hot, as it should be.

Thanks

Darren