Flushing coolant system

[Shran]

The problem with using antifreeze like that is that animals like to drink it since it tastes sweet. Weed killer may be no less poisonous but you won't find chipmunks and birds trying to drink it...

And you uhhh don't have to tell the parts store what's in the Jug. They don't look, if you say its motor oil they will take your word for it. Plus, I mean people must take 2.9 engine oil there to be recycled and that's always at least 90% antifreeze...

#1, it soaks into the ground really fast. There's no puddles and I'm not using huge amounts, maybe just a cup or two in any given spot. A little goes a long ways. An hour later and you'd never know it was there.

#2, O'Reilly and Autozone take names and addresses of people who dump oil at their stores. They have a big sign up that says if you dump antifreeze into their tank, YOU are responsible for having it cleaned out. And they either watch as it's poured in or pour it in for you.

 

[Dirtman]

Your autozone is weird. I've never even seen one with a tank. All the places here just have you leave the jugs of oil or whatever by the back door no questions asked.

When I worked at advanced we just stacked the jugs on a pallet and once every other week a truck came and hauled them off. They could have been filled with uranium for all we cared. We weren't Greenpeace lol.

 

[19Walt93]

Our town has "hazardous household waste collection" days several times a year, that's how I get rid of coolant. They always accept waste oil and it gets used to heat the town highway dept garage. Years ago towns would buy waste oil from garages and spray it on dirt roads to keep the dust down.
I didn't see any mention of pulling the block drains in the posts about flushing, hopefully it's being done. I've never reversed the hoses on my heater cores, I do back flush them when I flush the cooling system and do it often enough so the coolant never looks rusty.

 

[fastpakr]

Your autozone is weird. I've never even seen one with a tank. All the places here just have you leave the jugs of oil or whatever by the back door no questions asked.

When I worked at advanced we just stacked the jugs on a pallet and once every other week a truck came and hauled them off. They could have been filled with uranium for all we cared. We weren't Greenpeace lol.

All the stores around here seem to have giant containers inside in the back somewhere. Walk in with greasy oil containers and they just wave you back assuming you know where to go and what to do when you get there. No documentation at all.

 

[James Morse]

cool. thanks very much Dirtman

Shran have you tried white vinegar with a ton of salt in it and a touch of Dawn so it doesn't bead up on leaves. I think it works pretty well and totally non toxic, and cheap as can be. have to try to put it on when it's not gonna rain for a bit so the salt has a chance to soak into the plant, it'll kill it. kills grass in driveway seams etc. ivy seems the hardest to kill and is so invasive, but I think it will work on it, might take a couple applications. use sprayer of course.

 

[Shran]

I haven't used that exactly but boiling water and Dawn works pretty well too.

I have a gravel driveway and I get random grass and weed patches all over it. I get rid of one and another one takes its place somewhere else. Don't really like using actual weed spray because I don't like the smell so I use other stuff instead. One weird fact I discovered is that fresh gasoline will kill plants almost instantly, but very old gas won't do much at all. That was kind of disappointing, I often have really rotten gas from vehicles I part out.

 

[mikkelstuff]

So am flushing the cooling system in my 2002 3.0L Ranger. To do so I installed a garden hose flushing T in the heater hose downstream of the vacuum valve. Then I disconnected the lower radiator hose from the radiator and caught the old nasty coolant - about 2 gal.

Reading my manual, I see that this truck is supposed to hold nearly 4 gal of coolant. So where is the other 2 gal? Will disconnecting the lower radiator hose not empty the system (save for the heater core)?

 

[19Walt93]

So am flushing the cooling system in my 2002 3.0L Ranger. To do so I installed a garden hose flushing T in the heater hose downstream of the vacuum valve. Then I disconnected the lower radiator hose from the radiator and caught the old nasty coolant - about 2 gal.

Reading my manual, I see that this truck is supposed to hold nearly 4 gal of coolant. So where is the other 2 gal? Will disconnecting the lower radiator hose not empty the system (save for the heater core)?

Did you pull the block drains?

 

[mikkelstuff]

No. I didn't think Ford added block drains anymore. I'll have to look.

I do wish Ford had spent another 25 cents for a radiator petcock drain. I got about half a gallon of down my T-shirt and jeans when I pulled that lower radiator hose loose. There never seems to be a nice clean tidy way to do that.

 

[James Morse]

I watched a video on changing out coolant thermostat, and they are taking off the air intake and fan shroud and all kinds of stuff. How much, if anything, do I actually need to remove to get the thermostat out? It almost looks like I could get to it by removing nothing else, but, I could be wrong about that. If TRS has good vid on it I haven't found it yet. Thanks.