LLY: Type/Brand of Engine coolant
- Thread starter Wyley87
- Start date
Depends on what year Xterra. If it's 10' or later, it should have a blue coolant in it. Before that it was the normal green.
should, thats how we always did it at the shop i worked at. we used a garden hose, hooked into one end of either a heater core line or the radiator hose or both and turned the hose on. Ran it till the water comin out of the other end where the hose use to go to came out clear, drained the block and radiator again and then added my coolant/water mix. if you drain the block and radiator, there will be damn near no water left in the system. only a little in the oil cooler and some in the edges of the heads but thats it.
Why do you need to do a cooling system service and change the thermostats?
Thermostats should last more or less forever, and the whole point of Dexcool is that it should last at least 150k+ miles. Its not like the old days of green antifreeze where coolant flushes were considered "regular maintenance"
There is nothing wrong with Dexcool in an engine that was designed for it.
The duramax was....surprise....designed for dexcool! There are no materials Anyone who thinks/has-heard-from-someone that its "bad" or "causes problems" is incorrect. All of the seals in duramax's were designed for use with Dexcool, and green antifreeze can actually degrade the life of some of the rubber seals/gaskets. The only duramax's that Ive seen dexcool actually cause problems in, were from people mixing green antifreeze with the dexcool.
The old Gen II small blocks and 4.3's werent really designed for it, thus all the horror stories from the mid-90's about Dex-cool. And back then, everyone was mixing green and Dex-cool, which added to the undeserved bad-repuation that Dex-cool still hasnt quite lived down.
And Dex-cool has gone through several different reformulations since then. The current stuff is fine. Id love to see actual studies (not someones 'intuition' or 'gut' or what they've heard from some idiot mechanic down the street at Billybobs local garage) that show the current dexcool has problems in modern GM engines that were designed for it.
If you are still stubborn and want to run green, then go ahead, and have fun changing the coolant once a year or every X thousand miles...especially on the 06+ trucks that dont have a drain plug.
Which brings me to my next point about the 06+ trucks that dont have a drain plug. Yeah its annoying...and GM probably saved some money, but think about it....Dexcool is super long-lasting, so you'll likely only have to deal with that annoyance once or twice in your trucks lifetime.
And as far as the other "fancy" coolants (the caterpillar stuff, etc), its going to be a bigger PITA to find some if you are far from home...every auto parts store has dexcool. Advance Auto even has their generic brand dexcool thats only like $1.50 more than regular stuff....
JMO.
The duramax was....surprise....designed for dexcool! There are no materials Anyone who thinks/has-heard-from-someone that its "bad" or "causes problems" is incorrect. All of the seals in duramax's were designed for use with Dexcool, and green antifreeze can actually degrade the life of some of the rubber seals/gaskets. The only duramax's that Ive seen dexcool actually cause problems in, were from people mixing green antifreeze with the dexcool.
The old Gen II small blocks and 4.3's werent really designed for it, thus all the horror stories from the mid-90's about Dex-cool. And back then, everyone was mixing green and Dex-cool, which added to the undeserved bad-repuation that Dex-cool still hasnt quite lived down.
And Dex-cool has gone through several different reformulations since then. The current stuff is fine. Id love to see actual studies (not someones 'intuition' or 'gut' or what they've heard from some idiot mechanic down the street at Billybobs local garage) that show the current dexcool has problems in modern GM engines that were designed for it.
If you are still stubborn and want to run green, then go ahead, and have fun changing the coolant once a year or every X thousand miles...especially on the 06+ trucks that dont have a drain plug.
Which brings me to my next point about the 06+ trucks that dont have a drain plug. Yeah its annoying...and GM probably saved some money, but think about it....Dexcool is super long-lasting, so you'll likely only have to deal with that annoyance once or twice in your trucks lifetime.
And as far as the other "fancy" coolants (the caterpillar stuff, etc), its going to be a bigger PITA to find some if you are far from home...every auto parts store has dexcool. Advance Auto even has their generic brand dexcool thats only like $1.50 more than regular stuff....
JMO.
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I run ZEREX brand DEX-COOL in all of them I do. The new PRESTONE is OK I have heard, but the early PRESTON DEX COOL caised some issues. Like Ben stated, some of teh seals in teh system are designed for DEX-COOL, and changing will CAUSE leaks and problems to occur. And mixing coolants is a HUGE NO NO. And whatever you do, DO NOT USE THE UNIVERSAL CRAP FROM PRESTONE! As for stats, I have done a few sets here lately for engines that were slow to warm up. The rubber seal around the edge will get hard and doesn't seal off as well anymore which leads to longer warmup times. ALL t-stats are a MAINTENCE item, if you believe differently have an engine blow because of a failed one and try and have it covered under warranty. They are a pretty simple device, but the wax in them can leak out over time causing issues.
Both had DURAMAX engines, one was an 02 with 178K miles and one stat was partially hung open. The other one had 60K miles and was an 06, both of the seals going around the sealing area of the stats was hard as a rock. Both trucks were DURAMAX's.
I buy it from NAPA, only place I have found with it. I have found it doesn't have as much embitermint in it which gives you less mud build up over time.
I switched to green when I rebuilt my motor because the crate motor I bought sat with dexcool in it and destroyed the heads and cooling system. Basically anything that was aluminum that it touched was garbage. Obviously I didn't know this when I bought it. But keep in mind it's because the motor sat not cycling the coolant with air in system that caused this.
As Ben pointed out earlier, DEX-COOL is specifically designed to work with aluminum and is better for it than green is. DEX-COOL does not do well in open systems where air exposure is common(hence why all new vehicles with ELC use degas style bottles to minimze air exposure).