Dex cool got another victim

[Daniel Cuozzo]

good afternoon, I had issues with my radiator about two years ago. Replaced it and did a heavy duty flush. I removed the thermostat and ran the engine for an hour with the heat on and had a fresh water hose in the radiator. Flushed alll the dex cool orange out or so I thought. I refilled the radiator with a universal fluid. A couple of years later I popped the radiator cap and I see peanut butter. The dex cool orange must have been hiding somewhere in the engine. I am ready to replace the radiator, heater core and water pump. What is the best way to cleanse the dex cool peanut butter from my motor?
Thank you so much.

 

[SnowDrifter]

The thermostat on these is a valved variety. Taking it out with result in the coolant recirculating through the block not the radiator.

I suspect you could try snipping off the large spring - leftmost in this image. In theory the other spring should provide enough tension to force the thermostat into an open position. I haven't had to do something like that before so it make take a little trial and error to find what works.

As to the rest: What sort of buildup were you getting? Anything indicative of oil getting into the coolant via a cooler or head problem? Could you post some pics?

To flush, grab a garden hose. Open the drain valve on your radiator (or take it out, your goal is flow here). Use the hose to keep the system full and start the truck. You'll have a steady flow of clean water coming in and circulating through the system. You can also flip the hoses on your heater core lines to give them a back flush as you do this, just be sure to return them to the original position when you're done. It's color coded, black to black, white to white.

If you're feeling really cheeky, put the drain plug bag in the radiator, run a good bit of dawn dish soap through the system, then repeat the process I described above to get the soap out. It works well if you have oil contamination in the system.

After that, drain, fill, run, then drain the system a couple times with distilled water to get the tap water minerals out