Green Antifreeze versus Red Antifreeze

The new type antifreeze is used mainly because of the newer aluminium ,rads, also the alu.heads and blocks , it is not supposed to corrode as easily.

Rey

So the question still stands...... can you put green in on top of red or red in on top of green? Which is preferable to preclude the constant leaks I read about but have yet to experience?

mix'em if you want......all you will loose is the extended life property and the added corrosion resistance. the red stuff is not detrimental to gasket life, sealing surfaces and applied torque is the problem. small amounts of coolant loss can be stopped by using gm's coolant tablets or Bars Leak tablets. these tablets are excellent for sealing small seeps or leaks and won't clog heater cores or radiators

said

Red is only "better" (note the quotes) if it remains red.

If'n you add some green to it, even a sip, it's never again "better" than green. Like a virgin, once tainted, there's no going back. Never.

If'n you have green and you add some red, you still have green, with a tinge of red coloring. Nothing more.

I've (personally) have seen no convincing evidence red is better than green. It's claimed to last longer? Perhaps?

I've seen some data showing red is much less tolerant (than green) of contamination, especially air.

In my book, I see no benefits to red, and one drawback. Advantage green.

Oh yea, green is cheaper too.

Geoff Welsh said

Very true. In my 20 years in the automotive industry I don't think I've met anyone who flushes coolant yearly. Me included.

I would certainly be a more fair comparison. BTW, I had the red stuff in my 95 S10 for 100k. Seemed to work fine. Ditto for the green stuff in my 88 Camaro 5.0(?)L; 100k.

i knwo how you feel, i needed to replace my water pump because it blew from to much coolant being sent to the engine

Sounds good to me! GW

So what's the real reason behind so many GM engines which get coolant leaking into the crankcase? I thought it was because GM's head gaskets weren't designed to work with the new coolant, but I couuld be wrong. I thought I remembered reading the replacement intake manifold gasket was a different design than what came new...

Can somebody please explain the coolant leak problem?

Thanks

The coolant leaking into the crankcase will happen anytime you have a "wet" intake manifold. All of the older chevy small block v-8's had a "wet" intake manifold and to some degree had the problem occur. It wasn't that much of a problem when they used the older style of paper/steel mesh type of intake gaskets, but when they went to the plastic/rubber insert type of gasket, there have been all sorts of problems.

The 60 degree v-6 engines have "always" had an intake gasket leaking problem, ever since their inception. What's different now is the internet....any fool can get on and Google "gm intake gaskets" and get every horror story about intake gasket failures known to man. But I can tell you as a GM tech who was working on them when they first came out....they have always had a problem. There have been different generations and different styles of gaskets, but every one of them has had intake gaskets that leak at one time or another. Back then, nobody had this vast resource that we call the internet now. So I can imagine that very few people were aware that it was a problem on those engines. We knew it, because we were fixing them every day.

The 90 degree v-6 (3800) has never really had that much of a problem with the intake gasket until the GENII engine came along. Of course, it was supposed to be the latest and greatest version of the 3800, but it's worse, reliability wise, then the GENI engine. Even the GENI engine had the upper plastic plenum, but the design of the EGR valve and where the hot gases entered the upper plenum as different then the later GENII design. Once they changed to the GENII design of plastic upper intake, all sorts of problems occurred. Just a poor design that has now (supposedly) been rectified.

Now we have numerous newer engines that do not use a "wet" manifold (no coolant running thru the intake) and this will cut down on these types of failures a lot. The Northstar is designed this way, the new Generation of Chev small block v-8 is designed this way, I believe the new 3.6 VVT DOHC engine is designed this way. It took a generation or two, but I think GM has figured out that a wet intake manifold is a poor design choice. It's funny, my old 71 Plymouth Roadrunner with a 383 magnum engine had a nice "dry" intake manifold system. Much more sensible.

Ian

I sometimes wonder what percentage of GM 60 degree engines spring an intake gasket leak during their lifetime. Only a small percentage of millions sold would make for a lot of unhappy people.

I supose for vehicles still under warraty, dealers coukl get a rough ideal of the ratio between cars sold to warantee claims. Anybody chance a guess??

Would a periodic re-torqing of the manifold bolts stave-off this problem?

Regards, Al.

I've read that the DexCool reacts poorly with the green antifreeze, and really does a number on gaskets.