Here is a pic of my antifreeze dipstick.

I don't like the goop I'm seeing on the dipstick, any one know what it is?

I have 40K miles on my car and did use watterwetter once...is this the residue from watterwetter?

I have herd about this residue sideeffect from using watter wetter but I just want to check so see if anyone else has the 'goop' complex.

 

I believe that's oil. However, I don't know how it got there or what it means, but it doesn't look good..

 

Yeah if its oil, your pretty much screwed...

hey man, whipe it off, throw it back in and check on it periodically. Give it a flush, change the coolant, and see where you are, doesnt cost that much...

Jason

 

oil? ...that sux :-(
how the heck could oil get into the coolant system?

...in other words, where in the system (or what part) would it brake down so that oil could get in the coolant system..I don't see where that could happen?

 

seal.......

 

ohh sh_t :-( ... like main seal :-(

 

dont sweat it. wipe it off and see if it returns. i know most builders use vaseline to assemble parts. you are just seeing the excess working its way out. keep wiping. mine was gone after a few weeks. maybe you should flush the system too.
kris

 

>>hey man, whipe it off, throw it back in and check on it periodically. Give it a flush, change the coolant, and see where you are, doesnt cost that much...

well, I'll take your advice and check to see if it shows up again

 

by the way,...my exhaust is pretty 'clean'...(no excessive anmounts of white or blue or any color smoke)...and I'm still pulling 16-18 vac at idle....she purrs like a kitten and pulls hard at full boost...so there are no obvious signs of engine failure (crossing fingers, knocking on wood)...but i know that dosn't nessesarily coinside with a seal failure

 

I always seem to have a little junk on my coolant dipstick too, not really like that, more like little rubber bits, but the dipstick is never totally clean unless I take it to the sink and clean it. The thing is if you have oil in there, its going to keep getting on the dipstick until you completely flush the system. Cleaning off the dipstick won't help, you could clean it, stick it back in, pull it out right away, and it'll still have that film on it if its in the coolant. Even draining it won't help because the oil will just stick to the side of the resevoir and then float back to the top, so unless your coolant is completely clean, any impurity will float to the top and concentrate in that narrow overflow neck and cling to the dipstick.

 

thanks for the info...so to do a real flush i should take it to a shop and have them do the real deal on it ?(pressurized flush cleaning)?

..any way I can do it myself...like the 'garden hose' variety flush? (I don't trust many shops with my car)

 

Damian,
I heard the pressure wash way waasnt possible, I could be wrong on this, but they way we do it over here is add a flush to the coolant with just water, and let it run for a specfic time usually 10-20 mins, then drain and run water threw it till the water comes out clean.

However you can always have a place that know whats they are doing do it, and save yourself the trouble...
Since you dont trust the shops, look for some flush that you can run in the engine, NOT just the radaitor but the whole engine.. Should work out good for ya...

Jason

 

good info, thanks Jason...

 

No problem

 

I'm flushing it right now, its cooling down from the first warm up run with distilled water and flush cleaner stuff..... the stuff that drained out came out looked pretty good .... I'll water flush it one more time and then set it back up and see what the dipstick looks like after a few weeks

 

You know, I had that rubber bits crap in my AST cap and dipstick for over six years. In retrospect, I think it was the rubber of the o-ring seal.

Anyway, it started to give me the add coolant light death sentence but I block weld the block 3 times. It has held up over the last 2000 miles.

 

hmmm, rubber bits huh....well did it look like the pic i posted (first post) or different?

 

Dude...

I got the same stuff in my overflow container. I don't have quite as much, but I have a few drops on the spindle. My engine has about 25K and pulls like a MF'er. I run it at the track and know its strong. I got a compression check in may and it was perfect.

I also used the redline watter wetter in my car. I know my engine is good, I am 100 pct certain.

David

 

david, thanks for the info...its probably not that serious then...just crud and residue

 

just make sure your car does not smoke or smell like antifreeze.

 

nope, neither.... so that is a good sign (seals are still good)

 

a 40.00 compression test will tell you more, but everyone panics too much on this car. If your car does not white smoke, does not smell like anti freeze, if you are not losing coolant and not know why, your coolant buzzer is not going off and your car is driving good, don't worry about it.

thats my opinion.

Drive it till it breaks!

 

well, my car runs great, no smoke, no smell, not loosing coolant...so im sure its fine :-)

 

my car is fine too and i have that brown film also. my grandpa told me he's seen lots of cars with that...i flushed my coolant and it was pure green, no signs of oil or anything. Also if there is oil in your coolant, wouldn't you be losing coolant on a daily basis?

 

I checked the coolant dipstick today just so I could see and it actually looks nothing like that so don't worry about it. I thought maybe it was the O-rings slowly disintintegrating too, but after seeing how small the O-rings in the engine are, I realized that compared to the miles of coolant/radiator hose, its most likely coming from those and not the O-rings, although maybe some of it is from those .