Who loves replacing radiators? This guy...

On the way to work this morning, no heat from the vents and crazy idle surge. Got about 5 miles before the ol' crapbox started spewing steam out of the radiator overflow. Topped it off, let it get back to temp, started looking around and saw the bottom driver side of the radiator losing coolant. Made it to a parts store, got a radiator, and back home. Best part? Its about negative 5 degrees out. Cant wait to go back out into the garage and swap this sucker out. Currently seeing if any of my friends locally has a space heater.

Fun.

You have a garage and no heater ?

Changed out an ignition system in a thunderbird last night in a garage. The propane heaters do wonders.

All work in my driveway has halted. I have two engines sitting in front of the Ranger. I hope I can keep them straight.

Whats the car? Most my cars have radiators that can be disconnected in a few minutes.

The "icing" on the cake? Cutting your frozen fingers on the radiator fins!

The prediction of sub-zero temps here today is what made me bite the bullet and change the failing thermostat in my E39 when it was a comparatively balmy 22F on Wednesday.

This was a new looking junkyard unit I got at a pick n pull for $40 earlier this summer. It was about a million degrees and high humidity when I swapped the old one out that looked horrible. I'm waiting about an hour to warm up before I go back outside. I have a little baby indoor heater I'm going to use. Still will suck.

This summer's radiator swap:

beans wrote: Just got done swapping out the radiator. Pretty revealing pictures. Old New

We'll see how the O'reilly's replacement does.

If your luck is anything like mine, it'll leak where the end-tank seals within 20k miles

Beans, that looks like the one I dragged out of my miata the other year. Cores all falling out. Didn't leak, but didnt want to keep autocrossing on it.

In reply to Apexcarver:

Ye ol' "mothman" radiator was about the same, even though it looks like a sub-saharan special.

In reply to ProDarwin:

Looks like that's exactly what happened to this one.

I've had 4-5 of those piece of E36 M3 O'ReAdvantozone radiators in the MX6 since i've had it. Like clockwork, they start leaking after 10 months.

And then they like to try to tell me that they don't have a warranty on file, despite specifically asking for my phone number for that purpose upon purchase.

Oh, and i need to replace the radiator on the Cherokee this weekend. It's gonna be COLD.

Aaaaaaaaaaand now the dog just yack'd everywhere inside the house. Awesome.

ProDarwin wrote: If your luck is anything like mine, it'll leak where the end-tank seals within 20k miles

Ditto. I've swapped the one in the Protege twice and it needs it again. It can wait until the weather is a bit more cooperative.

Thanks for reminding me of why I spent a bit more and bought a boring 2008 minivan with reasonably low miles on vs. something older, more interesting and potentially more needy...

Mine did this to me during the Ascutney hillclimb right before the bridge:

Got a tow to the top of the mountain and swapped a new (pre-crashed spec Miata) radiator in. Kept running the rest of the weekend.

Mmmmm.... the Miata "Brown radiator ventilation" mod.

Ian F wrote: Thanks for reminding me of why I spent a bit more and bought a boring 2008 minivan with reasonably low miles on vs. something older, more interesting and potentially more needy...

It's not really a function of anything to do with that, rather that the aftermarket OEM replacements for a lot of cars in this era are 100% garbage.

And you really only have the choice between swapping them out yearly on warranty, or spending the money on a custom racing radiator setup.

Ouch.

Cleaned up the dog yack and spent 5 minutes outside getting the old one out. Definitely cold. Warming up for a minute before I go back out. I'm keeping this receipt in my glove box.

Good luck. 3/4 of my fleet got new radiators this year. It definitely sucks and the timing couldn't be worse.

Had to replace the radiator in the g/f's car about a month or two ago. Glad it didn't wait till it was freezing butt cold out to pop an end tank. Ordered a direct fit Denso replacement on Amazon w/integrated trans cooler loop. Total damage: $65 w/free shipping. How is this even a thing?

Armitage wrote: Had to replace the radiator in the g/f's car about a month or two ago. Glad it didn't wait till it was freezing butt cold out to pop an end tank. Ordered a direct fit Denso replacement on Amazon w/integrated trans cooler loop. Total damage: $65 w/free shipping. How is this even a thing?

I'm not convinced yet that radiators being so cheap is a good thing.

That said, i did just buy a monstrous all aluminum radiator for the Jeep for peanuts.

Yeah I brought an engine in the basement to dissassemble. Luckily though the 13b is about 200lbs and when your roommate lifts and stuff it wasn't too bad but I'm glad I won't have to carry it back up.

Armitage wrote: Total damage: $65 w/free shipping. How is this even a thing?

Because it will fail again within 12 months.

Mine did this to me during the Ascutney hillclimb right before the bridge:

Once they turn that color they are a time bomb.

So with all this talk of radiator replacement what are the tings you can do to prevent there early demise? I have had reasonable luck by swapping out the coolant every 2 years and while I am at it giving the cooling system a really good flush / cleaning. This has seemed to keep the rad's in my cars for extended periods of time.

Speaking of that. I was watching wheeler dealers last night and he was using the waterless coolant. I really like the fact that it is running under no pressure. I have always theorized that the repeated heating and pressurization cycles of the cooling system is a major contributor to there failure. No Idea if this is fact or fiction just me thinking again.