Prestone radiator flush

I have a '96 4.0 with 70k miles and the coolant isnt looking to good. So I'm going to give it a good radiator flush.

I picked up a case of Prestone's 50/50 mix antifreeze and distrilled water. I also bought a bottle of Prestone Radiator Flush. The napa counterman warned me against using this product unless the coolant is really bad. Mine isn't horrible, just needs changing.

He said it's such a strong flush that it would put additional wear and tear on my cooling system. He recommended I just run water in it and use no cleaner.

I will be using a 100% fluid exchange machine. I plan to fill the machine up with water, and possibly the cleaner, and let her run for 15 or 20 minutes. Then fill the machine back up with 6 gallons of antifreeze and let that flush through.

Should I use the prestone flush or not?

I also plan to replace the upper and lower radiator hoses, radiator cap, thermostat, and the thermostat housing. All parts will be from the dealer. Should I replace these parts before the flush, or afterwards and just top off with additional coolant? How much will drain out with both hoses removed?

Thanks for the help

90Pioneer said:

I also plan to replace the upper and lower radiator hoses, radiator cap, thermostat, and the thermostat housing. All parts will be from the dealer. Should I replace these parts before the flush, or afterwards and just top off with additional coolant? How much will drain out with both hoses removed?

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With both hoses removed, how much coolant will be lost? Just about everything except for a few dribbles in the bottom of the block and the heater core.

If you're doing the flush on the machine, the bottle sounds like overkill. It can cause problems as they said in the store too.

The only flush I would use would be the prestone 7 hour stuff. Drain the system, add the flush, refill with water and run it according to directions then flush it all out. It uses chemicals to dissolve the minerals that have built up and takes that long to do it. The 'fast' flushes are more like a sandblasting and leave alot of big chunks in the system that cause all kinds of problems from blasting the waterpump seal to wiping the water pump bearings out.
Was it a typo that your bought the 50/50 MIX and distilled water ? if so you do not have to add the distilled water to the already mixed prestone.

RichP said:

The only flush I would use would be the prestone 7 hour stuff. Drain the system, add the flush, refill with water and run it according to directions then flush it all out. It uses chemicals to dissolve the minerals that have built up and takes that long to do it. The 'fast' flushes are more like a sandblasting and leave alot of big chunks in the system that cause all kinds of problems from blasting the waterpump seal to wiping the water pump bearings out.
Was it a typo that your bought the 50/50 MIX and distilled water ? if so you do not have to add the distilled water to the already mixed prestone.

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I ment to say the antifreeze I bought was mixed 50/50, half antifreeze and half distilled water. This stuff isnt cheap!! $10.00 a gallon.

Napa didnt carry the 7 hour flush and no one had ever heard of it there??? I suppose I'll look around.

I also plan to use a bottle of Redline's water wetter.

I think his intentions were to add the distilled with the flush treatment. Then after flushing it all out, he would add the 50/50 mix straight up.
At least thats how I interpreted it.

I've got a 96 Sport and had to flush the system because my coolant had a brown color and the bottle had a sediment that had the consistancy of fine river mud. I doubt the previous owners ever changed the coolant. I used the Prestone flush and it worked great. I then running about fifteen gallons of tap water through the cooling system until I got clear water out the drain (literally hours). After all was said and done my water pump started to leak from the impellar three days later. So I had to change the impellar and again replace the coolant.
On the plus side, my coolant has been clear green for the past year now and the new water pump works great.

Vinegar is your friend here. Just buy a couple gallons and run that through instead. On the last intentional flush, I drained out about 2 gals of coolant and replaced it with the vinegar. Left it in for a couple of hours and it seemed to work pretty nicely. The only downside is that it smells like death when you drain it again.
HTH
Nathan

How about Massengils then? LOL!!! Sorry, couldn't help it...

rdx4me said:

How about Massengils then? LOL!!! Sorry, couldn't help it...

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Maybe the flowery scent one. Won't smell like death when you drain it...:laugh3: