Steel

Heh. Well the Rex never had a problem in the cold. Until Today.

What a morning. Woke up to the TV saying it was about -15 degrees outside. Ouch. No problem, rexxie can handle it.

I go out to start the car. Yeah, it was cold. I pushed down the clutch pedal to start the car. I never knew that they made clutch fluid out of molassas! And when i let it out, the engine dropped aobut 500 RPM. I bet i could have used that gear oil for a football. But anyway i went in for about 2 minutes to let it warm up a bit.

I come out and into the car with my friend, and i notice the the temp gauge was at normal. "woah that was fast" i thought. Yes. Yes it was.

So we go out to mobil and dunkin dognuts for some gas and coffee. 30 seconds into the drive, i notice the temp gauge is at halfway. Hmm. Weird. 60 seconds into the drive, I notice that it's at 3/4! Panic time! I turned off the engine and coasted down the hill into mobil.

This is when stupidity takes over.
I pop the hood and thinking that the car has only been on for 3 minutes in -15, i should pop the radiator cap.
Antifreeze tastes kinda good. Smells bad on your jacket though.
Lucky for me, it was still pretty cold (like, coffee that is just a little too cold) so that's why i'm typing here and not in the hospital for 3'rd degree face burns. But figured that's weird, temp gauge at 3/4's but the coolant not even hot enough to hurt.

So After i clean up a bit (to the wide eyed patrons of Mobil) i poured about a 75-25 mix of prestone and water into the radiator. Then i tried to start the car to move it forward 50 feet to the gas pump. I've never flooded my engine before, cool. So luckily from hanging out here all the time, i did the proper egi fuse pull, blew out the gas and started the car. Just as the tach hit 2000, it dropped to zero. The engine was still running fine, but the tach died.

Now this is getting ridiculous.
So after filling my tank, me and my drove around to check everything out. Temp was fine, so i pulled over, shut down the car, and restarted it. Now the tach works.
So now we're just driving around, and the low-coolant light and its irritatingly loud buzzer jumps on and off. I pulled over to check the overflow tank, and it was where I left it before. So after this, we came home, i let the car cool down, and directly topped off the radiator. No problems now. Very very cold morning indeed.

My questions are: is my assumptions that the antifreeze-water actaully froze in the lines correct? therefore preventing the coolant from moving, and heating up in one spot?

Also, why the hell isnt the coolant system sucking in that quart of coolant in the overflow tank when its yelling at me to add more?

Jeez.

jon88se

likely it is sucking it in...it mixes during driving, coming in and out. unless the system is totally over-filled the overflow should always have the same amount in it. I assume you just had the wrong mix of antifreeze and water and it froze, making it warm up fast and overheat a tad. It happened to me too about 2 years ago...and this morning my overflow was a bit slushy but the engine coolant was fine, warmed up normal and after a couple minutes the slush in the overflow melted. I got a bottle of coolant and just filled the overflow to max so i can get the ratio of antifreeze to water up. I figure if the system is a little too full it will come out the overflow tube.

EndlessRPMs

what about running straight coolant instead of a mix?

Scott 89t2

yikes time for a block heater!!

the lowest I've seen my water temps in the morning is 56F hehe with air temps probably howevering around freezing

Steel

straight coolant is... bad. Water is the best conductor of heat, so you should have SOME at least. I'm estimating that i'm running a 70-75% coolant ratio now.

Do they make block heaters for 7's? That would be very useful. If so... how does one hook it up?

Pinfield357

i have a little heater/magnet thing that you just stick onto the oil pan and plug it in.
i didnt think it would do any thing just one of those better than nothing type decisions, but the thing actually worked and worked very well

scathcart

I have two. You can HAVE it for shipping.

You take out your trailing coil spark plug, put it over the spark plug, and replace the aprk plug. there is a cord the plugs into it, and then plugs into a wall sockett.

Change your coolant to a perfect 50/50 mix of ethylene glycol/distilled water.

dr0x

Do you know where you can get the cord for that? I have the element, but no cord lol

scathcart

No clue.
this cord?

scathcart

a

scathcart

b

scathcart

d

scathcart

This is the cord. It plugs into the coil itself, and into a wall socket. It is long enough to reach to the front of the car, and can be hung out the front girll if you don;t want to pop your hood. You can remove it completely in the summer months.


This is the coil that faces the front rotor housing. That loop directly touches the rotor housing.


How the coil would look mounted. The bracket actually bolts to the P/S or A/C mounting assembly bolt or nut. I don't remember which, but I could check. The bracket is able to swivel.


How the cord plugs in.

I should probably check if it works...


Sorry for the really Low-Res pics.


EDIT: It works! In fact, it started smoking the moment I plugged it in. There is something on the element.
Yours for shipping. Should be $7 or so, don't have paypal.

Jimmy325i

I can tell you first off that too much anti-freeze gets the motor warmer than you want it. I had my block freeze this fall the first time our temps sank below 10 from running nearly straight water. (summer blend)

Right now I probably have a super sub zero mix running, but she does warm up a bit more on the highway after an hour and a half of driving. I need to fix a leaky bolt in my water pump housing so I can stop adding coolant all the time. just been pouring it in straight from the jug this last time around because my water jug was also frozen in the car.

jacobcartmill

iTrader: (6)

my car doesnt like it either !!!!

Steel

heh heh, considering it's been dippin below 0 these past few nights, and that it will continue to do so, i think i'll keep my current ratio until it warms up. Come summer im gonna be running 15-85, yeah bitch!

Jimmy325i

Oh, when my car froze i could've drank that water if I needed to for some reason without any real fear of poisoning... Cooled really well that way. I was fortunate I didn't lose the radiator from the freeze.

I'll change my ratio when I get around to dealing with that stripped bolt hole. (has a longer bolt in the hole that might have 2 threads of real grip) This week is suppose to be below 7 for the highs so I'm not worried about it getting too hot.