Garden hose coolant flush

[Geesie]

I want to flush the cooling system but the tap water here is really hard. If I do the garden hose flush method, how do I get all that water out of the block?

 

[KCEE442]

you dont ahve to get the water out of the block. thatcan stay and the water in the block and hoses will be the water part of your 50/50 mix and just fill up the rad with coolant. prob will take about a gal or 2

 

[custom442]

If you're worried about it buy some cheap radiator flush fluid at your auto parts store. My radiator is just fine with a little gunk but that's normal on a 25 yr old brass radiator, never flushed it once.


(And to answer your question, the only way to remove all the water is rinse with acetone and heat the metal until the acetone evaporates. There's no other cheap way of removing water, but again it's not needed and I wouldn't recommend it)

edit: reread your post, try using some sort of vacuum. Let me find a picture of a fitting to show you how to make a backyard or cheap vacuum with a hose... gimme a few minutes

 

[custom442]

you can make a vacuum with your garden hose using a water aspirator

read these: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspirator
http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/20 ... rators.php

here's some prices, see if your local plumbing/hardware store has some, if not these ones are pretty cheap:
http://www.google.com/products?hl=en&q= ... utput=nojs

And you should be able to buy an adapter fitting at a plumbing (if not hardware) store to fit the threads on the adapter into the end of your hose

All in all, it would cost you about 20$+ and you'd have a nice useful vacuum pump if you ever need it again in the future. Just connect a vacuum tube on the 'T' pointing outward of the aspirator, and it should suck out whatever fluid you have... try it on a glass of water first to test out

 

[megaladon6]

you can remove the block drains, that will take care of most of it. if you really want to get anal, use the evans NPG prep fluid http://evanscooling.com/catalog/C_npg1.htm it's designed to remove the water.

 

[kornball426]

Evaporating the water won't remove the mineral deposits... How do you think you get those stains in your bath tub or shower... Or out at your hose if you let it drip? The water evaporates, but leaves the calcium, lime, copper, iron... Whatever is in it behind.

Don't worry about it, it's mainly diesel, aluminum block/head, and turbocharged engines that you're supposed to use distilled water in. I forget the reason why, something to do with electrolasis or something... But most people just fill their radiator with tap water as far as I know.

And this REALLY goes for any engine that has magnesium parts... You MUST use distilled water or it'll eat away at the metal. This was a big problem in motorcycles when in an attempt to save some weight they made water pumps and stuff out of magnesium.

 

[custom442]

Evaporating the water won't remove the mineral deposits... How do you think you get those stains in your bath tub or shower... Or out at your hose if you let it drip? The water evaporates, but leaves the calcium, lime, copper, iron... Whatever is in it behind.

^^not if it's in solution with acetone, but this is hard to do with an engine because it'll need to sit a while to evaporate (with some coaxing of a heat gun in the passageways) ... also most people don't have access to large amounts of acetone for cheap

But it doesn't really matter, tap water isn't going to hurt anything