Which Coolant?

facade

Wig wrote: »

Hmm, maybe I'll look for some of that Propylene Glycol... sounds good..

It is the base for the liquid "vape" used in E-cigarettes.

It is also used as marine antifreeze as it is non-toxic, (but it's decomposition by bacteria causes oxygen depletion)

Ed China used to (or still does) work for a firm that made waterless antifreeze, (Most likely Evans) stuck some in a Proper Car that he was rebuilding once. Evans boils at 180 Celsius, propylene glycol boils at 188, so I doubt if Evans is neat propylene glycol.

Strider590

http://www.da7c.co.uk/technical_torque_articles/right_antifreeze.htm

mchale

EdGasket wrote: »

if you mix different types of antifreeze, they can gel and clog up the system

Is this true or a urban myth, have yet to meet anyone who has had this happen to them?

Strider590

mchale wrote: »

Is this true or a urban myth, have yet to meet anyone who has had this happen to them?

Actually, the images people post of apparent brown gunk in the system caused by leak repairing additives, is exactly the same gunk you get from mixing types of anti-freeze.

I think it's obvious how people get the wrong impression.

It's really quite hard to get old fashioned coolant/anti-freeze, I had to order it from Amazon for my kit car. The stuff they sell in motor factors is often OAT or HOAT, you can't even judge by the colour anymore as i've seen purple/blue HOAT.

Iceweasel

Strider is dead right - you can deduce absolutely nothing from the colour of antifreeze.

BeenThroughItAll

Strider590 wrote: »

Actually, the images people post of apparent brown gunk in the system caused by leak repairing additives, is exactly the same gunk you get from mixing types of anti-freeze.

I think it's obvious how people get the wrong impression.

It's really quite hard to get old fashioned coolant/anti-freeze, I had to order it from Amazon for my kit car. The stuff they sell in motor factors is often OAT or HOAT, you can't even judge by the colour anymore as i've seen purple/blue HOAT.

A colleague of mine has a collection of jars, steel and alloy tins on a shelf in his garage, containing various different mixtures of coolant of different types, as part of a test to prove/disprove this claim he undertook after some discussions on one of the Caterham forums he's a member of.


They've been there for at least four years now, and there is no gelling, precipitate or particulate in any of them. Just plain old variously coloured mixtures of coolant.


One more reason why I wouldn't hesitate to change coolant type between different chemistries, although I would flush with clean water and a heat cycle or two anyway, just to make sure the colour changed properly!

Nodding_Donkey

Wig wrote: »

It is well and truly flushed out, being run with clean water and changed.... and changed again.

I'm going ahead with the GM.

The Evans Power Cool was interesting, but how would I get ALL the water out of the engine?

With Evans prep fluid, you fill the system with it and heat cycle it to absorb all the old stuff. It can be used up to four times so best find someone to share the use of it with to save money.

EdGasket

BeenThroughItAll wrote: »

A colleague of mine has a collection of jars, steel and alloy tins on a shelf in his garage, containing various different mixtures of coolant of different types, as part of a test to prove/disprove this claim he undertook after some discussions on one of the Caterham forums he's a member of.


They've been there for at least four years now, and there is no gelling, precipitate or particulate in any of them. Just plain old variously coloured mixtures of coolant.


One more reason why I wouldn't hesitate to change coolant type between different chemistries, although I would flush with clean water and a heat cycle or two anyway, just to make sure the colour changed properly!

So is he temperature cycling those cans? I suspect not and therefore the experiment is not conclusive.

Apart from gelling (alleged or for real), mixing antifreeze types reduces the corrosion inhibitor properties compared to using 100% one type.

gilbert_and_sullivan

From memory the newer OAT coolants don't do any brass (possibly some other metal) parts as found on older cars in the cooling system any good, bog standard Bluecol or its equivalent would be my choice.

BeenThroughItAll

EdGasket wrote: »

So is he temperature cycling those cans? I suspect not and therefore the experiment is not conclusive.

Apart from gelling (alleged or for real), mixing antifreeze types reduces the corrosion inhibitor properties compared to using 100% one type.

Note - I never said it was conclusive - but no, he isn't. They have been through heat cycles, as the coolant mixes have all been taken as samples from vehicles running those coolant types, but they're not being regularly cycled.


Corrosion resistance is the reason he's got metal containers as well as just glass.


The lack of heat cycles certainly doesn't worry me. I've mixed coolant types in various vehicles in the past, as well as working on vehicles where mixing has occurred, and have yet to come across a single case of any precipitate forming.