Radiator

[Newbie57]

Near side indicator was playing up. Turned out to be a bad connection. Just as well as I had the wrong spare. Notice some coolant on the front under skirt in that side so looks like the rads gone. Seem cheap in e bay. Any how to's replacement? Also anyway of doing this without draining the whole system. I've doe it on a bike but the rads above the engine in that case.

[theredone]

coolparts radiator from e bay is perfectly adequate. there are threads anent replacement - try " how to " section.
to avoid draining the system you need to jack the front of the car up or do it on a slope and clamp the rubber hoses at the back of the radiator. collect the coolant from the rad in a bowl and you won`t need that much new fluid to top up.

[1979scotte]

As the wee man said above clamp off those hoses and all should go well.
The coolparts rad is the one i used.
However isnt the coolant suposed to be changed every 10 years?
Now would be a good time i think.

[Newbie57]

Ordered rad and clamps. A job for Saturday

[Newbie57]

Quick work from cool parts the rads here already.

[Newbie57]

How much coolant do I need if I replace the full system?

[1979scotte]

From memory only you need 2 5L bottles but you wont use it all. Or is it 3.
Do search it will come up.

[Newbie57]

Double the cost of the radiator  s:( s:(

[1979scotte]

Double the cost of the radiator  s:( s:(

For toyota extra long life?
Thats how i remember it.
You can use Halfords.
Probably cheaper.

[Newbie57]

I'll be checking halfrauds out. Let's see

[GT6]

i managed to do mine on my own took a few hours but not difficult, bought a 5 litre bottle of coolant from halfords and using it 50% with water only used about a third, had car parked on a sloop and did not even clamp the pipes, old rad looked a mess with the bottom third of it looking like it was destroyed. one tip the bleed valve at the top use the one on the old rad as the replacement one is not as easy to tighten up.

[Newbie57]

Need some help here. Where is the engine coolant drain plug. IAnyone have a picture? On the side of the engine facing the front of the rear? Do I have to take the under tray off to get at it?
Found it:)
Old radiator was a bit of a mess. Most of the fins in the lower third have fallen out. Thanks for the tip on the drain & bleed tap. I can't see how you could use the ones on the replacement part.

[JoeCool]

Need some help here. Where is the engine coolant drain plug. IAnyone have a picture? On the side of the engine facing the front of the rear? Do I have to take the under tray off to get at it?

Don't bother with the engine drain plug!!

Can't find my write up of my rad and hose swap annoyinginly, but anyway, there are 2 drain plugs at the front end of the long pipes under the centra ltunnel of the car. They drop all the coolant, with the rad tap and coolant tank open.

With the front end lifted, and those drains open, I dropped all the coolant just fine. Then swapped the coolant hoses to the Rad (but the rad itself would ahve been fine, mine had already been done).

After that, I dropped the front of the car, lifted the rear, and then filled the coolant system - importnat point: I had clear hose on the bleed taps at the top of the radiator and the heater matrix which let you get coolant to a level right across the car. I left it a bit, refilled it, ran it a bit (10-15 mins at ilde jsut to get coolant circulated ans the thermostat to open) then topped it off. It's been absolutely fine ever since, for 3,000+ miles including 4 hours flat out on the Nurburgring.

Don't overthink the coolant system on these, they're not that bad.

[Newbie57]

Do you all use distilled water to mix the anti freeze or just straight tap water

[JoeCool]

I used the Toyota 4 life which come pre mixed (and is squeezed out of unicorns tear by tear). I have it on good authority that the pink stuff from Halfords is as good as, and £5 for 5L premixed.

I would use distilled for coolant though. Nasty precipitates in your coolant aren't good for your engine.

[Newbie57]

More like £20 but still cheaper than Toyota

[insx]

This stuff looks interesting:

 m http://www.motexautomotive.co.uk/toyota ... ds-lubc-lu m

[Newbie57]

Maybe next time. Halfords stuff did the job. Was pretty straight forward in the end

[insx]

Yep, just for future reference as people will find the thread like I did. A litre of stuff from Motex kept me going but I can see droplets under the rad so I think I have a rad replacement job on my hands.