is the coolant gone

[diamond777]

changing water pump all belts and radiator fluid the blue bmw type. is all the radiator fluid out of this thing when i remove the radiator petcock and the engine block screw???

[Bill R.]

block passages and in the heater core and hoses.





changing water pump all belts and radiator fluid the blue bmw type. is all the radiator fluid out of this thing when i remove the radiator petcock and the engine block screw???

[diamond777]

the po used regular green stuff and i am switching to bmw blue stuff.do i need to get it all out and how do i do it????

[joshua43214]

You will need to flush it out with a garden hose, this is really easy to do once you have the water pump and thermostat out. Just unhook the 4 hoses that also go to the water valve and then just run water into every passage you can until it runs clear. You can probably get away with not opening the block drain, just make sure you start refiling with pure coolant until you have added 1/2 of its dry capacity, then switch to water.

I like to replace the T-stat when I do any major cooling system repairs, the part is cheap and is good insurance.

[JD525IA]

Tap water has tons of calcium and other crap in it!

[joshua43214]

You flush with tap water if you need to clean the system out. If the coolant is replaced in its proper interval with the proper coolant, no flush is ever needed, just drain the engine and radiator.

I would only worry about using tap water in areas that have hard water. Soft water won't cause any problems during the 2 year interval. I have performed thousands of cooling system services in my area and never seen any calcium build up of any significance on cars that are serviced properly.

Fill with distilled water if you have hard water or want the purist warm fuzzies. Even one of the the local dealers here uses tap water, don't know about the other, but I bet they do too.