If you put the light directly on the sight glass it illuminates pretty good.

 

I'm still on the original production degas bottle, installed when the truck was built in 1999.

It looks rather ugly, but no uglier than I am, so who am I to judge?

The reports of folks having to swap out degas bottles every year are baffling, and at the same time deflate any motivation to "preventatively" change out the OEM tank to avoid "probable" failure.

If that many new Motorcraft and Dorman tanks have failed, and if the welds on some of the aftermarket aluminum tanks have also failed or leaked as reported earlier, then which failure is more probable?

It doesn't matter to me if the aftermarket tank supplier happily exchanges a failed tank for a replacement, with no questions asked. It isn't the cost of the degas bottle. It is the cost and inconvenience of the failure, and the time and labor to remedy it.

 

Year later and the OEM replacement I installed with a new water pump and it's still fine. With the way it mounts to the body I think the plastic tank is the way to go. I assume the aluminum tanks crack due to stress from the body and frame tweaking over uneven terrain but that's just a theory and depends how the truck is driven. The radiator isn't hard mounted to the body at least at the top and probably for a good reason. The plastic tank cab give a little.

 

Unfortunately my Rudy's degas bottle sight glass cracked and is leaking. Hopefully they can send me a replacement sight glass.... Still not great. It is about 2 years to the day for me and probably about 7500 miles.

Worst part is we took a long weekend off to head to the mountains tomorrow and now I am stuck with not going or buying a plastic replacement ... Obviously we'll be getting a stock plastic tank and still going, but that is another $100 wasted.

 

That right there is why I stick to the plastic bottles. The metal ones fare no better, IMO.

 

The aluminum tanks definitely look better then oem. Mine is the original from nov 1998 with no issues. For that reason alone I would go with another plastic if it was in need of a replacement.

 

This is another case of " they don't make em like they used to" ... . . Unfortunately

 

@bajaphile , have you tried to remove the window and see if there is an o-ring or something that failed? It looks like the seam between the glass is leaking, but might be worth a few minutes if it saves you $100.


EDIT: Isn't that orange thing in the glass an o-ring? If so, you may be able to fix that in short order.

 

so I gather the new Ford replacements are sub parts compared to yester year?

 

I have not tried one myself but I have seen it mentioned on here a few times that the ford degas bottles we're having problems as well. After replacing three dorman tanks under warranty from splitting at the seams I ended up trying the aluminum tank from Rudy's like the one mentioned above. I have not had any problems with it but I will definitely be keeping an eye on the sight glass. In all reality it seems like a crap shoot as there is problems with all of them. There are some better made units out there but if I remember correctly they are pretty pricey. I'm really surprised that sight glass broke on the Rudy's tank. Wouldn't think that 15 PSI would do that

 

I bought one from the local Ford parts counter a couple years ago and have had no issues with it. For about half the price of one of the blingy aluminum ones I figured it was worth a shot. I try to stay clear of knockoff replacement parts like Dorman most of the time. Some have complained the cap doesn't seal right on those.

 

IMO they are a bad idea because of how they are hard-mounted to the engine bay in different spots. The plastic bottle has some flex and give to it.

 

​​​​@Sous Sorry the pic isn't great, but that orange thing is actually just my fingers reflection! The crack on the glass is difficult to see, but I'm 100% sure it was the glass. I had hoped it was the gasket, as I would have used some FIPG!

Dorman unit in for now... Made it up in the Sierras, all good there. It is actually nice seeing the coolant level with the plastic tank.

Unfortunately Rudy's customer support never wrote back to me to get a new sight glass.

 

Check either Ali-baba, or Made In China dot com, or both.

That is where Rudy's diesel products are imported from.

Back when I researched all of the degas bottles available on the market a couple of years ago, I stumbled across a vendor on Alibaba, and through a combination of searching resources that attempt to track international shipments via container, and the language "Rudy's Diesel" on the Ali-baba vendor website (in Chinese), I was persuaded to believe that those tanks were made entirely in China.

The difference between a Motorcraft part made in China, and a Rudy's part made in China, is that Ford Motor Company has a lot more weight than Rudy. So the probability of cheating on quality control, material homogeneity, manufacturing integrity, and pressure performance would seem to be higher where there is no promise of large volume future business at stake, no corporate oversight, protocols, or standards, and no checks and balances for periodic part and manufacturing site inspections, due to lack of resources.

But since you already have the part, and Rudy's is non responsive, it seems worth a shot seeing if you can't find the replacement glass piece directly from the manufacturer in China, since they have no compunction about selling to whoever is willing to buy. Might only be 25 cents for the piece, and $25 bucks for shipping, but that beats scrapping the tank for the aluminum. You could then sell a functional tank.

 

Good to see the trip was not spoiled due to poor build quality. I hope that Rudy's (I always think of the Mexican restaurant in the midwest when I hear this name) is able to make it right by you, but you may have to chalk this one up to "lesson learned".