JamesDart, Logan, 540Valiant- and all, thanks for hanging in here with me.
I am now on extended vacation from flying- but not from life. Dramas finished or set aside, or simply endured. . .now, 'till I drop or get the thing to work as it should.
Slight recap: as you all know, it was a long term sitter, with no one to set it up properly for long term storage- and we are suffering the results of that.
Anyway, about everything investigated you could think of. . .and I am looking at the thing, in the garage, just idling, watching the water flow. . .and I see small and not so small flakes of material go past. . .and I think, hey aluminum radiator. . .wonder if that stuff is ferrous?
Go find my magnetic tool picker-upper and stick it down into the water. . .and it comes back with rust particles all over it. Hot too, as you can imagine. . .
So I spend a bunch of time fishing around on top of the cooling tubes back and forth. . .
. . .and the amount of rust I collected off the top of the radiator core tubes would have easily blanked out most of the water flow. And, the previous lower hose was sucked flat when I got to it to replace. . . .
So, radiator out, shook out, cleared out as much at I can. Still more of the Rust Remover put in and run. Ran it around last night for about 40 minutes at highway speeds circulating the rust remover and without thermostat- so far so good. Now will run her in the 100+ degree heat and see today.
I am still going to get some of that Rust Dissolver you fellows mentioned- and I will have to have some sort of catch-all basin to collect rust in- otherwise, I will eventually ruin this expensive new radiator every time the engine coughs up a big loogie of rust into it- which appears to be what happened this last time. And, I have to wonder what is already inside the cooling tubes I haven't been able to move out so far. . .?
Logan, if you have a specific place to get the filter you mentioned, I am all ears. Jamesdart, 66aCuda, the stuff I have found to use as rust remover isn't what you were suggesting. You have a place where I can call to see if they stock what you were referring to? The stuff I got was for "neglected cooling systems" (!!!!) by Prestone, and is sodium citrate of unknown concentration. If something out there really MELTS rust into a liquid without eating the whole block (and me!) I might consider it. Otherwise, anything that peels rust out of the block will have to go into a catch filter that will plumb into the upper hose, take heat and pressure, and can be opened for cleaning.
Me, I was thinking of putting a strong magnet on the end of my pressure cap. . .or just sitting inside the upper tank for now.
Again, thanks for hanging in with me- my hands have just been itching to get back to this thing and fix it so we can enjoy it. . . Might finally have this thing on the mend here!
Mike
