On Monday evening, I tore the oil cooler out of my truck. It was a fairly easy process to remove the cooler. Not to difficult to take it apart. O-Rings were clearly on their last legs after 210,000 miles on a 2001 F-350 7.3 PSD. I cleaned up the ends of the cooler where the O-Rings go and lubed it up and put the O-Rings on, then put the ends back on the cooler. At that time I had run out of daylight. So I put everything inside the truck and waited until Tuesday evening.

On Tuesday evening, I began the process of installing the cooler back into the truck. This process turned out to be more difficult then removing. Had a difficult time getting the bolts started into the block. Eventually, I had them all installed and torqued to specs. Then came the realization, I had purchased the wrong coolant. By this time it was 8:30 pm and nobody was open that carried HD ELC.

Well with today being the 4th, there still isn't anyone open that carries the product I am looking for. Therefore, tomorrow morning I will be calling the local international dealer and obtain some of the correct coolant.

Hopefully, by the time Thursday evening rolls around, the truck will be full of liquids and ready for our 5,000 mile trip. Hoping to have the old truck ready for another family run. I will try to keep in touch over the trip. I know I haven't posted much on here, but I hope to be more active going forward.

God Bless and Thank You All for the wealth of information you provide to those of us who try to turn our own wrenches.

Ted

 

Glad you got e done! Ted for those of use who have yet to experience the oil cooler re&re can you let us know why you think it was so much more difficult to re install? Was it not pushed together enough for the bolt holes to line up or the ends were not aligned to stock (were twisted) or why do you think? By the way did you have to remove anything else to get it out initially? Thanks for any input you can give us.

 

As far as removing the cooler, I did not have to remove anything. To put it back, I needed to remove the lower radiator hose metal part attached to the water pump for clearance in restarting the bolts. My problem was it was me alone trying to line everything up and I just had a hard time getting the bolts to bite in the threads. I had one started in the rear and one in the front. The other three bolts were a real pain in the **** to get started. I just took my time and tried to be as patient as I could. It really did come out very easily and apart fairly easily. I had a little trouble getting it pushed back together, but it ended up going back together without too much fuss.

The issue came on the install to the truck. Trying to balance the cooler with one hand while getting a bolt started with the other. The ends might have been twisted a little, but I don't think that was an issue, because it lined up and snugged up nicely once I had all bolts started.

I definitely think it would have been easier to have had a second set of hands assisting, but my girls are a little too small for that. I pray I can find the HD ELC tomorrow.

 

Why not run straight distilled water for a couple of days and clean it out real good, before the ELC. Just my .02

 

What you suggest would be nice, but time is not on my side. We are leaving Sunday on a 5,000 plus trip. I want to have it all buttoned up and a few miles on it before taking off.

 

Latest part of the saga. No one locally carries the concentrate of HD ELC. Will it hurt to load it up completely with the 50/50 mix after getting as much of the existing coolant from the system. This has to be the most frustrating part of the whole process.

 

I would think that you would be OK, living in Texas. Run 7 or 8 gals of Distilled water through it for a few hours, drain the block and the radiator. Fill with 50/50 and go.
You can always pick up a gal. of concentrate before winter, drain out a gal. and add a gal.if you are not protected low enough.
I think the whole idea of using concentrate, is that you will not be able to completely drain all the coolant/water out, which will dilute the new 50/50 more. The main thing is to get all the old out if it was not elc. My .02 Jim

Distilled water at Walmart is .88 cents a Gal. here . need about 7 gal.

 

Do like hammer said and you will be fine, When I did mine all I could find was 50/50 been in there for over a year now and no problems.

 

Technically speaking, you will not get a complete 50/50 mix in your system if you only use 50/50 to fill it up, and that's because you cannot get all the coolant (or flush water) out by simply draining, and that is true even if you remove the block plugs. If I recall correctly, you'll at best end up somewhere around 45% coolant by using the 50/50 premix product. That's why it is always best to use 4 gallons of 100% and then top off with distilled water.

At the same time, I understand that you seem to have no choice at this point, so what I would recommend is taking along a couple of extra gallons of your 50/50 premix because you will experience slightly faster evaporation rates at 45/55 and you'll need to top off a little more frequently. Having the extra coolant on hand during the trip will be a little insurance for you.

 

It had the ELC in it before I began this project. I will drop in distilled and run it around for a while then drop the hose and drain the block and see where I end up. This has turned into a pain, just trying to fix the O-Ring issue. I pray I can get it all taken care of by Saturday evening.

 

Sounds like you've got the hardest part out of the way, and should be able to complete your flush and refill by Saturday easily enough, but saying that is assuming a lot of things about your schedule that I actually do not know about.

 

It seems to me if you had ELC in before you started, you would be safe in add in 50/50 and go. Just my .02

 

That is the way I am heading. Add and go. After flushing as much as I can.

 

If you already had ELC , why are you flushing?

 

Because I had antifreeze showing up in my oil analysis. Rule out as much contamination as possible.