When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Hi all, I was looking at my fuel cooler rad the other day trying to figure out an easy way to flush the green coolant out so I could install my red ELC coolant. Here is what I came up with.
Garden hose shutoff valve cnnected to garden hose, shutoff valve connected to garden hose by 1/2” hose barb adapter. (I got mine from tractor supply for our
farm and had it sitting on the shelf, 1/2” is a little to small but I stuck a hose clamp on it and cinched it down).
Pulled upper hose off the top of the fuel cooler to connect garden hose. (If I do it again I will connect a piece of hose onto the now open barb of the fuel cooler and stick it in a bucket, I ran coolant all down my engine
Run the garden hose till it ran clean, then took my rubber tipped air gun and blew air thru the system to get the tap water out. Refilled with red coolant and bled system. Easy as can be
while your in that part of the engine...replace that 20PSI mini cap. odds are that the cap no longer holds pressure resulting in coolant being dumped thru the drain hose and air being sucked back in. the cap is less than 10 bucks on amazon. if too much air gets in that system you loose coolant rating and boiling over occurs at lower temps....resulting in hot fuel runing thru the system and will show up as a code and check engine light for "high fuel rail pressure.
My son in law 2008-6.4 also has the green coolant. How did you bleed the system before filling back with perm coolant? Also, can you say how much coolant this held?
To drain, the best way is to drop the plug drivers side radiator, (gingerly) and capture. After that the bulk of the coolant lays in the belly of the lower radiator hoses. They are two part. Have a 4 gal tote, low level under the splice and disembowl the beast. You'll see what I mean, there's a 2 gallon drop my friend, go slow and let it drain before disection or your an alien.
Pull your degass bottle cap after the initial breach on the radiator to make it less of a waterfall until everythings in place.
Most won't or don't but button it back up and put only distilled water back in the degas bottle until it pukes like a vegas hooker. Start it static and let it get up to temp. Check degas bottle add water as needed.
Let it run for a beer or two checking gauge. Let it cool. Do the redo on the draining. Check all clamps and get a new degas cap and fuel cooler cap prior. (they are a weak link)
After you completely drain the unit as specified, it holds approx 8 gals of motorcraft premium gold coolant that you mix 50/50 with distilled water, so buy 5 gals of coolant and top off with distilled. I say put the direct coolant in first so you know your covered for temp and add water as needed. (get it anywhere but make sure it is motorcraft unless you have something up your sleeve. Cost is @ 16 shmokers a gallon.
That is more than a sufficient flush and fill.
Most will say otherwise but the lower rad hose juncture is the belly of the beast. Just be patient in draining and the refill.
2 weeks after I did mine, the degas bottle dropped by a quart. I refilled with water and the world is good.
I know, I know.........you did the math on the coolant mix.........he's at my same latitude so err to caution and get a 10 percent boot that your not going to crack up.
Seth, I believe it's a shared system. Not seperate and apart. I'll do more research but I'm pretty sure the big tank circs thru the small system. Everything I've read so far says that you can fill the system from either cap. That makes me assured that they are married. The vertical rise from everything in the bay regarding cooling gives me the eye opener. But I haven't found anything to argue that they are not shared. You find something let me know, but when I drained the rad, I had the cap off and the elevator went to the basement on the fuel cooler as well. I did however top it off at the cooler and watched the degas bottle without fluctuation. Could be on the altitude side of the therm.
