Question about Antifreeze color

[DennisG01]

As you may have seen in a recent thread, I flushed my heater cores. In doing so, I first drained about 2 gallons of AF. It is approximately 1-1/2 years old (when engine was replaced). It is the red/orange Dex-Cool. It looks a little bit "muddy" - not sure how else to describe it. Not bad, but it certainly wasn't bright like the new stuff I added in. Heck, the new stuff is practically "day-glo".

Should I be worried?

Is testing it for protection level sufficient?

Are those inexpensive testers (with the different color balls in them) reliable?

[Robyn]

The little floating ball testers will get you in the ball park for sure.

The antifreeze will tend to get dirty and discolored with time.

I prefer the Plain old green stuff instead of the Orange stuff.


Best

Missy

[a5150nut]

:cool:What I learned with Dex Cool is if you use tap water or get any other contamination in the cooling system it stars to build what looks like red clay. Drain your system, flush with instant tea or any other flush you prefer and replace the Dex Cool if that is what you want to run. Us distilled water DO NOT USE TAP WATER to fill. Bleed system of ALL air and you should be fine.

If you use instant tea DO NOT USE PRE SWEETENED! Plain generic instant tea works great. Drain, flush with clean water. Add tea and fill. Run for an hour or two. Then flush and rinse. Replace with coolant. :D

[DennisG01]

Thanks, Robyn. I'll pick one of those up at the parts store.

Tap water? I mixed the Dex with distilled yesterday... but I wonder if the shop that put my engine back in used tap. I guess a whole flush is in order.

Thanks!