Yes but I was reading the label on some product, not coolant, and it specifically said to add with bottled drinking water. I cant remember what it was but it was some product in an Autozone type store. I was actually shocked to read that. Ill look for it next time.
What's the Current State of the Coolant Debate (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter TriaxialBulls
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Yes but I was reading the label on some product, not coolant, and it specifically said to add with bottled drinking water. I cant remember what it was but it was some product in an Autozone type store. I was actually shocked to read that. Ill look for it next time.
as some context here to my recommendations: 8 years as a master tech in a japanese/asian repair shop. i have changed hundreds of water pumps/timing belts in the seattle area, many a times the same car, over the life of the car.
whatever you choose, make sure you flush it very well first. mixing gets you sludgey gel in hard to clean areas inside the block, heater, and radiator. acidic cleaners help, but i’ve also tried ‘super clean’ floor cleaner and that works too surprisingly.
the water you choose should be pretty clean, like <50ppm. seattle has exceptional quality tap water so you would see no problem there. flint has >2000 ppm so if you live in flint, you need to use distilled.
i avoid using the euro purple and toyota long life pink. euro purple seems to become corrosive if neglected, and toyota pink seems to be hard on water pump seals.
long life blue, dark green, and red are great coolants and can probably be stretched to 5 year intervals without effects on longevity of parts.
cheap bright green barely lasts 2 years before showing signs of pH change, which gets you mineralization in the coolant (when it looks hazy like it has a fine sand mixed) from reacting with the metals.
hope this helps.
whatever you choose, make sure you flush it very well first. mixing gets you sludgey gel in hard to clean areas inside the block, heater, and radiator. acidic cleaners help, but i’ve also tried ‘super clean’ floor cleaner and that works too surprisingly.
the water you choose should be pretty clean, like <50ppm. seattle has exceptional quality tap water so you would see no problem there. flint has >2000 ppm so if you live in flint, you need to use distilled.
i avoid using the euro purple and toyota long life pink. euro purple seems to become corrosive if neglected, and toyota pink seems to be hard on water pump seals.
long life blue, dark green, and red are great coolants and can probably be stretched to 5 year intervals without effects on longevity of parts.
cheap bright green barely lasts 2 years before showing signs of pH change, which gets you mineralization in the coolant (when it looks hazy like it has a fine sand mixed) from reacting with the metals.
hope this helps.
Whatever product that was, chemistry probably wasn't important. Windshield washer fluid concentrate probably doesn't care about a few parts per million of calcium or whatever. The pH level wouldn't be critical.
But it was a product for the cooling system.
Like what? Coolant system flush? Wouldn't matter much. What you saw, if you're not misremembering it in the first place, doesn't matter. Chemistry is important in coolant, which is why you should stick to distilled water.
- Thread starter
- #26
That’s great info, thank you. A couple questions if you don’t mind:
1. When you say bright green, are you referring to the “all vehicle” stuff mentioned earlier? Or do you mean the old school green?
2. How do these recommendations change for people with brass or copper radiators? for people with copper or brass radiators?
Royal Purple- Purple Ice
Cooling System Optimizer and Conditioner
On the back of the bottle it says:
Directions:
SHAKE WELL BEFORE USING
-Make sure cooling system works properly and is free of blockage and corrosion
-Use 1 oz to 2 oz per quart of coolant with antifreeze/water mix or 2 oz per quart of coolant with straight water.
-Bottled, filtered drinking water is recommended. Distilled water is not recommended, unless mixed with 50% antifreeze.
-Replace annually
I guess Royal Purple is saying it recommends that if you run straight water, it should be bottled, filtered water.
It does not recommend running distilled water only.
PURPLE ICE® | Royal Purple
Last edited:
- Thread starter
- #28
Wow that's pretty weird, I have never seen anything like that. I almost want to see if I can give RP a call and talk to one of their engineers, but with the whole COVID situation right now I doubt that would be possible.
Soooo, actually, if I lived in LA, I'd run straight FIJI and Purple ICE! Straight water provides better cooling, the "coolant" just provides anti-freezing and anti-corrosion, so if it doesn't ever freeze in LA, and the Purple ICE gives you corrosion protection......to hell with red, green or any "coolant"! Right? 
My 80 came from the southwest and when I got it, it had no thermostat at all and straight water in the system. I guess that's how they roll out there.
My 80 came from the southwest and when I got it, it had no thermostat at all and straight water in the system. I guess that's how they roll out there.
- Thread starter
- #30
Hey that means it was a RACING 80, because a lot of tracks require straight water to avoid antifreeze spills on the track. Your truck probably ran Willow Springs every week.Soooo, actually, if I lived in LA, I'd run straight FIJI and Purple ICE! Straight water provides better cooling, the "coolant" just provides anti-freezing and anti-corrosion, so if it doesn't ever freeze in LA, and the Purple ICE gives you corrosion protection......to hell with red, green or any "coolant"! Right?
My 80 came from the southwest and when I got it, it had no thermostat at all and straight water in the system. I guess that's how they roll out there.
It also raises the boiling point.
and the junkyards sell used coolant that has been filtered if you so desire to go that route too.
My routine with a neglected cooling system. Flush, flush, flush (using a mild cleaner) and garden hose with Tstat removed, drive it, drain it, block and radiator every time, refill, drive it (heat control full hot), drain it. Then a couple of distilled water only flushes (3 gallons at a time), drive it, drain it. Replace Tstat, final fill 50:50 Toyota Red and Distilled water. Drive it for 10 years. No issues.
If you want to spend the money you can send a sample of used coolant to a lab to have it analyzed. The big truck fleets do that (based on mileage) and if the tests come back good they keep running it.
I would not use any tap water for the final fill, got chorine in it if it came
from a city/county system, and that theorectically might accelerate corrosion.
I recall reading something years ago that talked about distilled water will pull ions (metal) into it from the metals it came in contact with until it reached some equilibrium. IIRC that was using straight distilled water that was flowing (not a sealed system) and not when it's mixed with the proper concentration of coolant. Disclaimer: I'm not a chemist.
IME Toyota Red and distilled water 50:50 after a thorough cleaning/flushing of the system = no problems.
IDK.
If you want to spend the money you can send a sample of used coolant to a lab to have it analyzed. The big truck fleets do that (based on mileage) and if the tests come back good they keep running it.
I would not use any tap water for the final fill, got chorine in it if it came
from a city/county system, and that theorectically might accelerate corrosion.
I recall reading something years ago that talked about distilled water will pull ions (metal) into it from the metals it came in contact with until it reached some equilibrium. IIRC that was using straight distilled water that was flowing (not a sealed system) and not when it's mixed with the proper concentration of coolant. Disclaimer: I'm not a chemist.
IME Toyota Red and distilled water 50:50 after a thorough cleaning/flushing of the system = no problems.
IDK.
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- #34
Just wanted to chime in with some more research that I've done. And yes, I know that I'm way overthinking things, but honestly with quarantine going on I have nothing better to do than sit and research stuff like this.
BLUF: Prestone coolants probably not good for our 1FZ, Zerex green is best but Zerex red is good too.
To begin, if we pull up the SDS for the Prestone green "All Vehicle" antifreeze and the SDS for Preston Dex-Cool:
we see that they are basically the same, with the exception of the omission of "Neodecanoic Acid, Sodium Salt" from the Dex, However if we pull up the SDS on some Dex-cool from another brand:
We can see that it does include this "Neodecanoic Acid, Sodium Salt". This Dex-Cool SDS looks exactly the same as the Prestone's "all-vehicle" coolant. So when you are using that Prestone antifreeze, you are basically putting Dex-Cool in your engine. Personally that's not something I'd like to do, as I'm sure many here are aware of the problems that Dex has caused in the past; specifically, the culprit was this "2-Ethyl Hexanoic Acid, Sodium Salt" that's found in all the coolants listed above. This article goes into detail as to why this stuff can be bad. Basically it is not compatible with silicon components; I'm not sure what stock components will be affected by this, but it's very possible that there are some. But the plot thickens when we look at the SDS for Prestone's Red Toyota coolant:
because it actually has this same "2-Ethyl Hexanoic Acid, Sodium Salt" as well. Again, I absolutely would NOT use any coolant containing this stuff in a 1FZ. If we pull up the SDS for Zerex's red coolant (Valvoline is nice enough to provide all their up-to-date SDS's for free). This coolant contains no 2-Ethyl Hexanoic Acid, but instead contains the inhibitors:
Anyway, I also stumbled upon this patent, which provides a lot of evidence as to why both silicates and phosphates can work in conjunction to provide good protection:
www.freepatentsonline.com
Specifically, silicates are good at fighting aluminum corrosion, just like dipotassium phosphate. So I pulled up the SDS for Zerex Original Green, expecting to see silicates. But there were no silicates at all to be found. Instead, it uses the following inhibitors:
And again, none to be found. Actually, the only corrosion inhibitor is Sodium Nitrite, which doesn't seem very good. So it seems like any coolant that used to contain silicates is now using a mixture of Borax and sodium nitrate, or just sodium nitrate. I don't know if this is better or worse than the red's sodium benzoate; you could buy sodium benzoate pretty cheaply and add it to the green if you wanted (not sure how it would react, I might take some green and mix some sodium benzoate in and observe it over a few months). You also get significantly more potassium phosphate with the red; you could probably add some to the green to give it some more aluminum corrosion inhibition. Given that the Zerex green has a sodium compound and borax, while the red only has a sodium compound, would lead me to guess that the green is better. But I am not well-versed enough in chemistry to really understand the differences.
A few other facts I learned looking through Valvoline's MSDS's:
BLUF: Prestone coolants probably not good for our 1FZ, Zerex green is best but Zerex red is good too.
To begin, if we pull up the SDS for the Prestone green "All Vehicle" antifreeze and the SDS for Preston Dex-Cool:
we see that they are basically the same, with the exception of the omission of "Neodecanoic Acid, Sodium Salt" from the Dex, However if we pull up the SDS on some Dex-cool from another brand:
We can see that it does include this "Neodecanoic Acid, Sodium Salt". This Dex-Cool SDS looks exactly the same as the Prestone's "all-vehicle" coolant. So when you are using that Prestone antifreeze, you are basically putting Dex-Cool in your engine. Personally that's not something I'd like to do, as I'm sure many here are aware of the problems that Dex has caused in the past; specifically, the culprit was this "2-Ethyl Hexanoic Acid, Sodium Salt" that's found in all the coolants listed above. This article goes into detail as to why this stuff can be bad. Basically it is not compatible with silicon components; I'm not sure what stock components will be affected by this, but it's very possible that there are some. But the plot thickens when we look at the SDS for Prestone's Red Toyota coolant:
because it actually has this same "2-Ethyl Hexanoic Acid, Sodium Salt" as well. Again, I absolutely would NOT use any coolant containing this stuff in a 1FZ. If we pull up the SDS for Zerex's red coolant (Valvoline is nice enough to provide all their up-to-date SDS's for free). This coolant contains no 2-Ethyl Hexanoic Acid, but instead contains the inhibitors:
- Sodium benzoate
- Dipotassium phosphate
Anyway, I also stumbled upon this patent, which provides a lot of evidence as to why both silicates and phosphates can work in conjunction to provide good protection:
Aqueous corrosion inhibitor - Ashland Inc.
The present invention provides heavy duty long life corrosion inhibition formulations and compositions for inhibiting mineral scale and the corrosion of metals particularly the cavitation corrosion of
Specifically, silicates are good at fighting aluminum corrosion, just like dipotassium phosphate. So I pulled up the SDS for Zerex Original Green, expecting to see silicates. But there were no silicates at all to be found. Instead, it uses the following inhibitors:
- Disodium tetraborate
- Sodium nitrate
- Dipotassium phosphate
Grainger SDS Lookup
complyplus.grainger.com
And again, none to be found. Actually, the only corrosion inhibitor is Sodium Nitrite, which doesn't seem very good. So it seems like any coolant that used to contain silicates is now using a mixture of Borax and sodium nitrate, or just sodium nitrate. I don't know if this is better or worse than the red's sodium benzoate; you could buy sodium benzoate pretty cheaply and add it to the green if you wanted (not sure how it would react, I might take some green and mix some sodium benzoate in and observe it over a few months). You also get significantly more potassium phosphate with the red; you could probably add some to the green to give it some more aluminum corrosion inhibition. Given that the Zerex green has a sodium compound and borax, while the red only has a sodium compound, would lead me to guess that the green is better. But I am not well-versed enough in chemistry to really understand the differences.
A few other facts I learned looking through Valvoline's MSDS's:
- Their "Asian Blue" and "Asian Green" coolant are literally the same thing, with different dyes. They are also both the same formula as the red; of course, on these industry SDS's the percentages are all given as a range, so it's possible that they all have different concentrations of the ingredients. They are all around the same price, so get whatever your vehicle recommends
- The G-05 stuff is similar to the Asian Red, but it replaces the Dipotassium phosphate with Disodium tetraborate. It seems redundant when you have the sodium nitrate/benzoate combo. The G-05 also replaces the sodium nitrate (NaNO3) with nitrite (NaNO2); I don't really appreciate what this difference does, but I'm guessing it's not too big. Basically the G-05 seems to have really good iron corrosion inhibition, but doesn't seem to have any inhibitors targeted at aluminum. Not great for our 1FZ's.
- They sell a lot of the inhibitors as additives; honestly with some math and combing through SDS's, you could probably make your own coolant formula. You could also just buy the chemical salts and dissolve them in distilled water, and then mix them with ethylene glycol.
- Looking at the SDS's for all the Prestone "Prime" products is kinda disappointing: their "all-vehicle" is literally just ethylene glycol and diethylene glycol. No additives. At least it's cheap. In a pinch, you could probably add that to pretty much any cooling system of any color, without harmful effects.
Uh oh. My truck had green fluid in it when I got it, and has been running Prestone ever since. I've got 15 years on it. Tell me truthfully Doc, how long have I got with her?
- Thread starter
- #36
She's as good as dead. Ill tell ya what, I'll take her off your hands and give her the best end-of-cruiser-life care I can muster, free of charge
You are going to send yourself to the deep end if you need to research everything like this for a Cruiser
Nah, Pikes Peak.
Damn, I must have missed these threads when replacing my 3fe cooling system last summer. 7k miles later on 50/50 prestone and she maintains temp and gets down the road quite fine. Now to replace the f'n kick down cable.
You are going to send yourself to the deep end if you need to research everything like this for a Cruiser
and you've come to the right place to do so
