Cloudy Coolant

[effjayzee8tee]

Recently got in a minor front end collision in my '93 FZJ80 with 240k miles, and even though there was no apparent damage to rad/ATF cooler, I noticed the coolant in my overflow reservoir looks a bit brown and cloudy. Any idea what it could be?

Relevant information:
-After the accident I did notice a 'wet spot' on the AFT cooler but figured I was just clumsy and spilled a little oil on it when I did an oil change last week or splashed some coolant topping off the fluid
-Haven't replaced head, flushed coolant/transmission, etc. recently (or since I bought it 5 years ago for that matter)
-Recently found a small leak in one of my rear heater lines above the cat heat shield and had to replace the rusted factory clamp with new hose clamp, maybe rust got in the system?

Any help would be appreciated!

 

[leonard_nemoy]

If your coolant is 5 years old I would expect it to be cloudy.....

Flush the system with 5 or 6 gallons of distilled water and change your coolant. Than clean that cooler with some carb cleaner or brake cleaner and see if the spot comes back.

Edit:
You should probably do this in the reverse order from what I posted above. Clean the grease spot and determine if the atf is contaminating your coolant first. Than once you resolve that issue change your coolant.

 

[effjayzee8tee]

Sweet, thanks for the advice; she's def due for a flush anyway! If i'm worried there's coolant mixing with the ATF, should I flush that too?

 

[leonard_nemoy]

Just my opinion but you need to determine if the fluids have mixed or not. Clean the grease spot first. If the grease spot comes back than you can probably assume there is a leak and both your ATF and coolant have mixed. If this is the case than I would recommend changing the coolant and ATF.

 

[scottryana]

You are talking about 2 different issues. You could have a leak at your external ATF cooler that has zero relevance with your engine cooling system.

How are the levels in transmission and your radiator overflow?

Clean the external ATF cooler, or wipe it with a white paper towel and see if it is ATF or oil.

Then for your engine coolant, you could drain some into a clear container from the radiator petcock and see what it looks like.

 

[effjayzee8tee]

Just my opinion but you need to determine if the fluids have mixed or not. Clean the grease spot first. If the grease spot comes back than you can probably assume there is a leak and both your ATF and coolant have mixed. If this is the case than I would recommend changing the coolant and ATF.

Yes this is one of my main concerns, and even further which direction they've mixed. ATF in the coolant means a new radiator not a huge deal, but the OTHER way mean big problems in the transmission dept. no bueno!

 

[effjayzee8tee]

You are talking about 2 different issues. You could have a leak at your external ATF cooler that has zero relevance with your engine cooling system.

How are the levels in transmission and your radiator overflow?

Clean the external ATF cooler, or wipe it with a white paper towel and see if it is ATF or oil.

Then for your engine coolant, you could drain some into a clear container from the radiator petcock and see what it looks like.

Thank you for this! Let me ask you this: if there's a break somewhere in the radiator and ATF is getting in the coolant, is it reasonable to assume there's also coolant getting into the transmission? I understand that the former isn't a bid deal (just replace the transmission and flush the cooling system) but the latter is a huge problem (and I don't want to end up replacing the transmission..)

 

[scottryana]

Thank you for this! Let me ask you this: if there's a break somewhere in the radiator and ATF is getting in the coolant, is it reasonable to assume there's also coolant getting into the transmission? I understand that the former isn't a bid deal (just replace the transmission and flush the cooling system) but the latter is a huge problem (and I don't want to end up replacing the transmission..)

It depends how quickly you catch the problem if that is really your problem. If you break the trans cooler in the radiator the fluids can mix both directions. But that would not show up as a leak on your external trans cooler. You could have both issues, but I would spend a little more time diagnosing things.

 

[effjayzee8tee]

Thank you for this! Let me ask you this: if there's a break somewhere in the radiator and ATF is getting in the coolant, is it reasonable to assume there's also coolant getting into the transmission? I understand that the former isn't a bid deal (just replace the transmission and flush the cooling system) but the latter is a huge problem (and I don't want to end up replacing the transmission..)

Also I haven't had time to do more digging into fluid conditions, bubbles in overflow reservoir, etc etc, but I did look at the color of the coolant in the overflow and it was noticeably darker. Will dig deeper into it this weekend. Thx for advice!