I was reading the emissions removal write-up on rotary resurrection's site and noticed that he uses vacuum caps for plugging coolant lines by injecting some high temp gasket sealer into them which keeps the coolant from reaching the thinnest part of the cap, the center. I used 5/8" (?) vacuum caps before and the engine block connection barely lasted a day, it developed a rip through the center section. Has anyone used the sealer and vacuum cap method for capping them? What else are people using? I've had them looped for about a year but that line is annoying as hell to deal with and I have to drain the coolant everytime I remove the turbo.

 

you could try putting a smaller cap in the hole so it gets stuck and then a bigger cap on top of that and rtv in the middle. it's still only going to delay the inevitable.

 

loop lines FTW

 

The looped line SUCKS. It runs all the way across the engine bay transferring heat to part of the harness, intercooler piping coulpers, TID, etc. and its right above the turbine housing probably no more than 3 inches from it. Completely unnecessary considering I don't even have heat.

Kevin Lander's idea is pretty good...someone has to have done it already. The biggest vacuum cap barely fits over the outlets from the engine block and radiator so I don't think I can find a bigger one.

 

Use a Copper plumbing tube end Cap.Shove it in a Piece of Rubber hose and Clamp it.Better yet is to have the cap on a small,say One inch piece of Piping,In teh Rubber Hose.That way you can Double clamp for Security.

 

so ur saying instead of routing the heater hose back into the radiator or above the turbo you can just cap it?

 

I have my turbo coolant return port capped with a silicone vacuum hose from McMaster-Car http://www.mcmaster.com/ctlg/DisplCt...54344087987953

 

Yes. All the ideas in this thread suck. The simplest way is to use a small section of heater/coolant hose, clamp one end to the port and plug the other end with a bolt and clamp it.

 

thats the ghetto but easiest way to do it. The two absolute correct ways would be to cap it with a brass cap or reroute the water but thats a bit more work and its unnecessary. thanks alot guys

 

I was looking at the same thing on McMaster. Nobody really knew how well it did for extended periods of time, but only at 200degrees or so. Also posibley hitting 15psi or more. Do you track your car, or is it a street driven vehicle?

Worse comes to worse I'm going to use a piece of heater hose and use a bolt as a plug

 

putting vacuum caps on coolant lines is no good. they will crack and leak in no time (ask me how i know). either loop the lines or drill and tap the holes and plug them.

 

<*sigh*> this has been discussed before.

I've run the Help vacuum caps on the heater core nipples. The one on the block won't last, but it's a good temporary fix. The one on the lower radiator return line will last longer since it is on the lower pressure side of the cooling system.

The silicon caps will tolerate heat better, but they are very susceptible to cuts and abrasions, usually from whatever hose clamp you use. They will eventually split.

The better solution is to use a length of heater hose (which is a much tougher material than the vac caps) and a stainless bolt of similar dimension. Use RTV black on the bolt along with a clamp. I've run the track car for a while with this setup and it works fine.

Best solution is to have the nipple removed and a proper plug installed when the engine is out of the car (easily done during a rebuild). The lower radiator return can be welded shut (on an aluminum radiator) or simply get a radiator w/o one.

-b

 

BTW a vacuum cap on the radiator coolant port will hold up. I run constant 200 degree water temps and shoot up to 210 occasionally under hard driving. I've put over 3000 miles on the car with this setup, my reasoning was that the coolant in the rad is much cooler than the block. I've had the engine block port welded.

 

I forgot to mention that I did use high temp sealant on the cap before I installed it.

 

I did a "ghetto but made it look clean" way of plugging the coolant port. I used JB-weld (hand putty/stick kind) and stuffed some in the port and made the JB-weld overlap the nipple. So far there hasn't been any problems with it slipping out of the nipple.

 

I wanna see a picture of the JB-weld fix. Personally I wouldn't use JB-weld to do anything, but that's because I think of JB-weld in the same light as mighty putty, temp fix for things that need perm fixes.