Hot Rods Adding antifreeze to a non-running car???

If your rad is not full, fill it up with straight antifreeze. A 25% mix is only good for about +10 degrees. Contrary to what some might like you to believe, a +10 antifreeze protection will still freeze solid (at about 0) enough to break a block, split a radiator, and split a heater core, if the temp gets down to -20. Whats in the block, will likely not "mix" on its own, in time to prevent freezing at -20 until maybe Jan or Feb, unless your lucky. The heater core and the rad are generally the highest points in the cooling system, adding pure antifreeze will probably save them.

If your system is full, disconnect a heater hose, and add antifreeze into the rad cap, letting the old coolant drain out of the heater hose from the head/block, not the water pump, (it has to be below the top of where ever your adding the antifreeze, pinch off the hose running to the water pump with vice grips). It won't be a perfect mix, but would be much better at getting the pure antifreeze into the motor then just disconnecting the lower hose and refilling. The only way to truely mix the antifreeze is to circulate the coolant with the water pump for at least 15 minutes if there is no thermostat. If there is a closed thermostat there, it will have to circulate much longer. Gene

 

Heater core is probably figured into the 21 quart total capacity??? I forgot about that. I eliminated that with just a bypass hose. So I probably decreased the total capacity some amount. The system had to be low as I added almost a whole gallon of concentrated antifreeze to the expansion tank. Which tends to make me think the mix is stronger than my initial thought. I removed and blocked off the upper radiator hose but it was still finding its way into the radiator as it started pushing it out the top connection of the radiator. The coolant is very rusty and will need to be changed in the spring.

 

WOW, this thread is a doozy...Its like asking how much oil is in my engine and is it dirty ???????
Why don't you just start a fire under the oil pan, the water won't freeze......

 

The post was almost a week ago any damage?

 

Not yet!