Metal Shavings in coolant. (1 Viewer)

[OkinawaJoe]

Last evening I was outside checking the oil level and looking making sure I had enough coolant, while looking into the top of the radiator I notice tiny foil like shavings in my coolant, upon closer inspection I noticed the coolant had little swirls of what seem to be very fine glitter. I ordered a water pump this morning. According to the factory gauge I am running at normal operating temp and, I haven't noticed any coolant leaking from the pump or anywhere else, and I don't smell coolant so no leaks (I only mention this because on other vehicles when the water pump has failed it has been a seal that has failed which leaked through a hole in the bottom). The only moving part where shavings could come from is the Pump right?

 

[bmwjnky]

How long have you had the truck? Maybe a previous owner put stop-leak in the cooling system because stop leak usually has fine metal shavings in it to help plug up holes. This was the case with a Land Rover I had about 5 years ago. PO put stop leak in the system and even after the cooling system was fixed and flushed I'd still see small metal flakes when checking the coolant level.

 

[OkinawaJoe]

How long have you had the truck? Maybe a previous owner put stop-leak in the cooling system because stop leak usually has fine metal shavings in it to help plug up holes. This was the case with a Land Rover I had about 5 years ago. PO put stop leak in the system and even after the cooling system was fixed and flushed I'd still see small metal flakes when checking the coolant level.

The PO had replaced the radiator prior to selling due to it leaking, and it's not out of the realm of possibilities for him to have used stop leak with the old radiator. Edit: I have had the rig since Feb of 2015.

 

[Tools R Us]

Likely it's something like AlumAseal or other cooling system sealant?

 

[Golgo13]

PLEASE post pictures of the old water pump when you take it out. If the metal flake IS the impeller, it should look pretty weird and I want to see an f-ed up impeller. I'm sure everyone would like to know.
If the water pump isn't f-ed, replace it with the new one and keep the old one with a gasket as a spare.

 

[Tools R Us]

PLEASE post pictures of the old water pump when you take it out. If the metal flake IS the impeller, it should look pretty weird and I want to see an f-ed up impeller. I'm sure everyone would like to know.
If the water pump isn't f-ed, replace it with the new one and keep the old one with a gasket as a spare.

The impeller is steel, it could get into the housing and/or cover but that would take significant movement, would expect bearing noise, big leakage, fan flopping around, etc.

 

[Tools R Us]

The factory water pump is extremely reliable, don't recall ever seeing one bad, almost all of the rigs we deal with, still have the original. The only ones I have seen changed were by the "if it aint broke, keep fixing till it is" excessive maintenance brigade. A couple of weepers have been reported on here, but don't recall any dramatic failures on the 1FZ unit, the older F type motors are a different story.

 

[inkpot]

I would pull the radiator to flush it. That way you can shake it upside down so the crap comes out the easy way. Drain over a bucket or tub so you can see how much crap there is in there.