What to Do: '95 Camry Four with Green Coolant

We had the water pump and timing belt done on our '95 wagon last year. The parts were aftermarket, not Toyota, but we asked for Toyota coolant. Now it appears they used the regular green stuff. The car is behaving ok, but the reservoir is nearly empty (this *may* be normal evaporation) and there is a red scum in the reservoir. Do we have it power flushed with the original radiator still there, or not? Red coolant or green?

Reply to
Leftie
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Red coolant or green won't make much of any difference in your life - just make sure you don't run it on plain old water. Your more important question is why you have scum in the reservoir. My recommendation is that you use any color coolant you want to - if you can't decide, flip a coin - just make sure you monitor the scum in the reservoir. Of course, you should also clean out the reservoir as much as you can before your refill. Good luck!

Reply to
dsi1

I'm concerned that the red scum is from the (hopefully) small amount of Toyota coolant left in the system reacting with the new, green coolant. I want to know if this is likely, and how safe a flush would be as opposed to a drain and fill. I don't want to 'kill' the radiator or heater core.

Reply to
Leftie

I've never heard of different colors and types of AF creating scum but there's a lot of stuff I've never heard of. Anyway, if you're concerned about mixing different types of AF you should refill it with the same regular green stuff. I personally don't like the idea of messing with caustic flushes and powering out sediments for fear of causing leaks - I think a lot of old car guys think like this although maybe we're just being superstitious. :-)

Reply to
dsi1

I'd sure be interested to know if green and red AF makes sludge too - hopefully, someone will know. My bet however, is that your sludge is caused the old fashioned way - an internal engine leak.

Reply to
dsi1

I appreciate your willingness to respond, but this is really a question for the more knowledgeable people here - especially the techs. The red Toyota AF has a different formulation than the usual green stuff.

Reply to
Leftie

Red scum is usually caused by iron rust and /or oil in the system.

IMO, the bruhaha about most antifreeze packages is highly overblown. The auto companies are not using many new alloys in their products, and the old green material did a pretty good job - in some cases better than the OAT technology.

OAT technology deleted some or all of the silicate used in previous formulations which were there to protect the aluminum castings. OAT (Organic Acid Technology) did not adequately address this in some formulations, IMO.

As mentioned before, if you drain the block and rinse it out, refill with a good grade coolant (antifreeze package) mixed into distilled water.

NEVER let the reservoir go dry. If you do that, you can suck air into the engine when it cools....Keep it appropriately topped up with distilled water and coolant.

You might have a leak somewhere (water pump, radiator, hose welch plugs, etc), or a leaking head gasket or cracked head is not impossible. That reservoir getting low is a bit troubling. Usually evaporation is slow, compared to how often you OUGHT to be checking the levels.

Reply to
hls

Fill it to the required level and monitor it. Their is probably a small weepage amongst one of the hoses. Make sure any worm-drive hose-clips are tight, if the leak is on a hose that has a spring-clip, then the alloy engine fitting may have corrosian denying a clean smooth surface for the hose to seal on. Replace spring-clips with worm-drive ones. If it still uses coolant, then a slow headgasket leak could be indicated. A quality stop-leak used *as directed* can work here.

and there is a red scum in the reservoir. Do we have it

Power flushing and active scourers are a bad idea IMHO. Any dislodged rust just collects in the finer water-passages and radiator. If you must, dont do it with the radiator in circuit,..it will just block-up. Reverse-flush the rad by putting a hose in the top hole and allowing the bottom hole to drain.

Jason

Reply to
Jason James

Check this site out:

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If the 2 coolants you're referring to, both use Glycol as the major ingredient, mixing *may* be OK. Try and find-out which one the mechanic was using compared to the Toyota stuff.

Jason

Reply to
Jason James

I'm not inclined to have the radiator flushed at all. It seems unlikely that the head gasket is leaking: the car gets light use (which is why the reservoir wasn't checked recently) and has not overheated. I'm concerned that maybe the "new" water pump may be leaking, and I'm concerned about the red scum. Which, BTW, is the same color as Toyota coolant...

So, Toyota techs and hardcore shade tree mechanics: is it safe to leave the green coolant in, and add more after cleaning the reservoir? Is the Toyota water pump the only reason the red coolant was used?

Reply to
Leftie

Thanks for the link. Not very encouraging, though. I'm still hoping one of the techs here has actual experience with both Toyota coolant and standard green coolant in '90's era Toyota cooling systems.

Reply to
Leftie

It's too bad the shop doesn't follow your instructions. However the "green" may actually be one of the many new OAT formulations out there (can you find out?) If that's the case, the main concern is if the coolant has 2EHA acid, which is a plasticizer that can soften cheap plastics in the cooling system. Valvoline Asian and Peake Global are two aftermarket 150K mile coolants without the 2EHA. I'd think they are better alternatives to Toyota Red than Prestone All-Makes or GM Dexcool.

The old silicated coolant is very effective at fighting cavitation corrosion. Traditionally the only pumps can't deal with silicates are Asian import pumps. The cheap rubber seal can't deal with silicates like domestic/European carbide seals. But silicates are primarily used in European cars these days with GM, for example, having no silicates at all in the Dexcool.

I'd still want to see only the Toyota Red, or Peake Global coolants in the system. Repeated drain/refill with distilled water should flush the old coolant out. It helps to take the thermostat out. But this works only when you're using concentrates, so that rules out Valvoline Asian or Toyota Pink (pre-mixed), at least initially.

Today's coolants should mix with all others, at least that's the claim if you read them all (and still believe them). ;)

Reply to
john

The car is going to get a 'drain and fill' at a dealership tomorrow, and we've told them to look for leaks. Let's hope they don't find any.

Reply to
Leftie

My housemate brought the car to a local dealer, and while they "found" many things wrong with the car, they didn't find any leaks in the cooling system. It got drained and refilled. Fingers crossed.

Reply to
Leftie

Good. I hope this will solve your anxiety about the situation. Remember, though.... dont let that overflow cannister go empty. There is, or should be, a line on it for the minimum fill level. You dont want to be sucking air into an engine when the engine cools and draws the overflow back into the engine.

Reply to
hls

Yes, I know how to check it. Again, the car wasn't used that much, so it wasn't checked often. Now it will be.

Reply to
Leftie

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