Volume of coolant

[Mucus72]

Yet anther coolant thread, sorry! So I am happy (after a second attempt) that the thermostat kicks in and pumps water around up the bottom hose. The rad gets hot at the bottom and all hoses eventually get hot. Nothing to do with convection, feel confident all is ok.

 

My question is that I am concerned that I only got 4 litres of coolant (measured accurately) into it from the bleed tee. I haven't driven the car yet but it sits idling on my drive and the water temp gauge doesn't go over 80 degrees. I have an 82 degree thermostat according to previous owner notes. The rad fan also has not kicked in yet but the top and bottom of the rad are almost too hot to touch.

 

Does this all sound OK? I couldn't measure coolant out before the job because the reason for refilling is due to previous radiator failure and loss of unknown vol of coolant - caught early because the temps didn't rocket and there was still coolant in expansion bottle.

[Jonathan Kay]

What model and any modifications?

 

Sounds good so far. Do you have a heater and, if so, do you think it has filled and works?

 

I'd check that the fan cuts in appropriately while you're thinking about it.

 

Jonathan

 

PS: Why start a new thread?

[Mucus72]

Re the PS, because I think it's a little more polite not hijacking an OP one generally, each to their own...

 

The fan does kick in Jonathan, and the heater is working so no air lock at the top. I have been for a blat and see no coolant level drop (whilst too hot to open the bleed tee).

 

I will check again this evening but I think in my case - a 1.6 SS k series quite a few mods but only the bleed tee piece in respect of the cooling system - just over 4 litres seems to be working for me. Anxious because the consensus is that you can squeeze 5 in.

[revilla]

Marcus,

 

I would have replied earlier but been away for the weekend, just got back.

 

It's odd because all the signs are that water is circulating and the system is working normally, but on neither of my two engines would 4 litres be anywhere near enough. 4 litres wouldn't quite bring it to the point where it reached the radiator top vent (which you don't have, so you wouldn't know). It takes moe than 5 litres to fill it completely.

 

I know your is 1.6 and mine are 1.8 but the blocks are identical, even interchangeable, and I believe yours has a VVC head like mine but with the VVCs blanked off? If so, should be pretty much identical in terms of water capacity as you also have a heater andf general plumbing like mine.

 

Did you remove the thermostat in the end? I'm just wondering if the thermostat isn't drilled and you didn't remove it, it may have retained quite a lot of water in the block and head? Even after removing the head on my engine quite a lot of water remains in the block, but it does at least drain down to the level of the water pump, but with a closed thermostat it might struggle to get out.

 

Andrew/

[Stationary M25 Traveller]

Recall I got around 4.5 litres in my system.

[Mucus72]

Hi Andrew and Ian. Yes, let's call it 'water retention'. With the thermostat closed, cold, and at the lowest point, I must have roughly a litre in the engine block. My third attempt, if the second had been unsuccessful, would have been a drain and removal of thermostat and drill. But because the second attempt went Ok I didn't bother. I'm feeling confident all is well, and the 80-82 degree, fan sensor, thermo open, cool cycle is working beautifully.

[Jonathan Kay]

I think you'll be fine. I'd keep an eye on the temperature and the coolant level for the next few runs. Besides, what other options are there?

 

Jonathan

 

PS: Thanks for the response about threads. I prefer the opposite. Let's see what happens when we get the technical wikis up. I'm sure that coolant filling and modifications will be one of the most popular.

[revilla]

Just to add my two pennies' worth to the "thread debate" - personally I find things easier to follow in technical problem-solving threads where there is one thread per problem per car as often similar problems in different cars turn out to have different underlying causes. It also makes it easier to see what has and hasn't already been tried and eliminated where the discussion refers to one single case.

 

Take for example a case I was helping diagnose recently. The symptoms were basically poor starting and running when cold. It turned out tto be a combination of:

 

- Butterfly valve loose on spindle.

- Spindle loose in throttle body and leaking air due to circlip and seal failure.

- Lambda sensor heater drive output from ECU burned out.

- High resistance in loom causing ECU supply voltage to drop to 5v whilst cranking. ECU then rebooted and recycled IACV.

- Engine had been custom mapped by Z&F WITH ALL THOSE FAULTS IN PLACE so the mapping was compensating for them - therefore fixing them individually made it run WORSE.

 

I doubt there are many other cars around with the same rash of issues but there are plenty of poor starters and cold runners. You can imagine that the thread became long and complicated enough without throwing others into tthe mix.

 

So while I do like the idea of longer threads for continuing discussions of general points amd ideas, I like short, concise and distinct threads for detailed technical issues. This is why, after a couple of threads (which I concede probably have been one) about tracking down a mysterious oil leak on my car, when I finally determined that somebody had put a gaping hole in the side of my block with an angle grinder, I started a new thread. "How Do I Weld A Hole In My Block" seemed more likely to lead to a technical solution (and it did) than continuing a thread on an oil drip that immediately had people thinking about the crank rear oil seal.

 

Anyway I guess we all have different ways of thinking about these things. At least we can all seem to agree that the Good Morning Thread shouldn't be started anew each day 😬