middlecalf
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- #1,181
It’s been a week of situations. I generally am not fond of situations.
I‘m about to do my inaugural run into the hills with 800+ lbs of protein tubs for the grass munchers, they’re getting antsy. I’ve done a number of salt block and fence building runs already this summer. Mostly skookum. But on the last run, not so much. I have a routine that when I get back to the shop I blow out the rig’s underside and radiator with pressurized air because of the buildup of weeds, grass, junk that accumulates. I noticed on this last trip in/out that my coolant overflow was completely full and overflowing. The temp gauge was just above the middle line. IR temp of the thermo & water pump housing showed around 185-deg. So no obvious overheating. The next morning, none of the overflow coolant had migrated back into the block, which it usually does.
So I drained and flushed the block/radiator, filled with Evaporust and let sit for two days. Drained the Evaporust (it was colored as expected for this old iron block) and flushed the system extensively. Pulled the thermostat and boiled it, it opened at ~180-deg as spec’d. Put it all back together, filled with 50/50 coolant and fully burped it. Started it, ran it for a bit, temp gauge got to about 1/4, and the overflow bottle filled up again and started overflowing. IR temp of thermostat housing was ~110-deg, top of radiator was ~100-deg, water pump housing and lower radiator hose were ~185-deg. Overflow coolant was still cool to the touch. I’m guessing the thermostat hadn’t opened yet based on these temps.
So what’s up? Is the radiator cap defunct? It was the one that came with the OEM radiator which is as new as this rebuild. Given the relatively cool radiator top as well as the low temp gauge reading I guess the cap‘s pressure release is due to something other than increased temp (P*V = rho*R*T kind of thing)??
Here‘s the installed rad cap
I‘m about to do my inaugural run into the hills with 800+ lbs of protein tubs for the grass munchers, they’re getting antsy. I’ve done a number of salt block and fence building runs already this summer. Mostly skookum. But on the last run, not so much. I have a routine that when I get back to the shop I blow out the rig’s underside and radiator with pressurized air because of the buildup of weeds, grass, junk that accumulates. I noticed on this last trip in/out that my coolant overflow was completely full and overflowing. The temp gauge was just above the middle line. IR temp of the thermo & water pump housing showed around 185-deg. So no obvious overheating. The next morning, none of the overflow coolant had migrated back into the block, which it usually does.
So I drained and flushed the block/radiator, filled with Evaporust and let sit for two days. Drained the Evaporust (it was colored as expected for this old iron block) and flushed the system extensively. Pulled the thermostat and boiled it, it opened at ~180-deg as spec’d. Put it all back together, filled with 50/50 coolant and fully burped it. Started it, ran it for a bit, temp gauge got to about 1/4, and the overflow bottle filled up again and started overflowing. IR temp of thermostat housing was ~110-deg, top of radiator was ~100-deg, water pump housing and lower radiator hose were ~185-deg. Overflow coolant was still cool to the touch. I’m guessing the thermostat hadn’t opened yet based on these temps.
So what’s up? Is the radiator cap defunct? It was the one that came with the OEM radiator which is as new as this rebuild. Given the relatively cool radiator top as well as the low temp gauge reading I guess the cap‘s pressure release is due to something other than increased temp (P*V = rho*R*T kind of thing)??
Here‘s the installed rad cap