HI Guys,
a simple question, where does one legitimately dispose of old coolant, my local civic amenity site wont accept it, I now have 20 litres to get rid off. The reason being, was that I did a coolant change back in January and with not much happening during lockdown i decided to do something about the slight weep of coolant from the right cylinder head. The engine is running so well I did not want the potential problem of removing the head so after some research I decided to add Steel Seal to the cooling system.
A simple process, drain a small amount of coolant add 2 bottles for engines over 2.5 litre and top up, run engine up to temperature and leave running for 30 minutes with heater fully open and maximum fan, the coolant reached 100 degrees, and leave to cool. The next day when I started her, the usual initial slight fluffing didn't happen, so maybe I had a slight leak into a cylinder as well, all good, but on driving out the temperature rapidly climbed to 90 with the electric fan permanently running with temperature soaring to over a 100 after I switched the engine off. The same happened the next day, so I decided to completely drain, flush and refill with fresh coolant. Well, engine now running at normal temperature, just over 80 and no drop in coolant level and still no slight fluffing on start up. I can only assume that a chemical reaction was continuing to happen with the Steel Seal in the system accounting for the 10 degree rise in running temperature, but it does seem to have done what it said on the bottle, so a good result in the end, but resulting in another 10 litres of old coolant to dispose of hence the initial question. Maybe my experience though may be useful to anybody else with similar coolant leak from head gasket.
Cheers Mac
a simple question, where does one legitimately dispose of old coolant, my local civic amenity site wont accept it, I now have 20 litres to get rid off. The reason being, was that I did a coolant change back in January and with not much happening during lockdown i decided to do something about the slight weep of coolant from the right cylinder head. The engine is running so well I did not want the potential problem of removing the head so after some research I decided to add Steel Seal to the cooling system.
A simple process, drain a small amount of coolant add 2 bottles for engines over 2.5 litre and top up, run engine up to temperature and leave running for 30 minutes with heater fully open and maximum fan, the coolant reached 100 degrees, and leave to cool. The next day when I started her, the usual initial slight fluffing didn't happen, so maybe I had a slight leak into a cylinder as well, all good, but on driving out the temperature rapidly climbed to 90 with the electric fan permanently running with temperature soaring to over a 100 after I switched the engine off. The same happened the next day, so I decided to completely drain, flush and refill with fresh coolant. Well, engine now running at normal temperature, just over 80 and no drop in coolant level and still no slight fluffing on start up. I can only assume that a chemical reaction was continuing to happen with the Steel Seal in the system accounting for the 10 degree rise in running temperature, but it does seem to have done what it said on the bottle, so a good result in the end, but resulting in another 10 litres of old coolant to dispose of hence the initial question. Maybe my experience though may be useful to anybody else with similar coolant leak from head gasket.
Cheers Mac
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