When you drain the coolant from the petcock on the radiator, does any coolant drain from the block as well? I've found with my autos, that after draining all of the coolant using the petcock, I often have a hard time getting the prescribed amount of antifreeze back into the radiator.

 

The petcock will drain the block but not completly , in the shop what we do is take out the thermosat [ put the cover back on ] , open the petcock the put a garden house in the rad. fillneck and turn on the house untell the water just enough to run over and let run until the water is clear coming out the petcock, if its real dirty then undue one end of the lower rad. hose , then let drain , when empty close & button back up with new thermo. and top off with pure coolant then run for a few min. then use a coolant tester [ less than 5 bucks for cheap one] it should be at least 50% and not more than 70% , just drain and fill to make right, but if you just dain and fill with 100% and it will be very close.

 

I backed mine up on a set of ramps to help drain the block out.

Make sure to mix the anti-freeze & water before you pour it in! In other words take a empty one gallon jug and mix 50/50 in it!

 

How come? I figured that if you know the system capacity, and want 50% coolant, you just put half the capacity of antifreeze in and fill the rest with water. No?

 

The reason I mix it is due to your initial question. Chances are even thought you do all you can to drain the block, you will never get in what you think you will. Then...your mixture will be off. Easier to mix before in my opinion.

 

Why not juist invest in a relatively cheap anti-freeze tester so that you know what the actual temperature your mix will protect to? That way you can also check your other vehicles to see if they are also protected in the case of a deep freeze. Saves time, and money cause you do not change the anti-freeze, just to make sure your covered.

 

Use distilled water when mixing your own. Goodluck,,Rick

 

I just replaced mine 2 weeks ago. I also changed out all the hoses. When draining with the petcock I got less than 5 gallons out maybe 4 to 4 1/2. When I pulled the lower radiator hose off I would say close but less than another gallon came out cant say for sure as it went all over the garage floor. When I refilled I could only get 5 back in (including the overflow/expansion bottle). After a few heat up and cool down cycles I added about another gallon. So in total close to six gals but only 5 at most on initial fill then another gal over the the next day or two into the expansion bottle.

By the way I noticed you have 94k. Might want to look at your hoses in the places you cant see well specifically the lower hose at the 90d bend it makes just before it goes into the rad. I have a 145k on mine and thought I would change them even though they looked good. I bought the hoses and was thinking I could have waited for while to replace them because they still looked so good. However as I replaced them I noticed a wear spot on the mentioned hose as it rubs on a wire loom and I found most of the hoses to be fairly mushy. Glad I went ahead and changed them.

 

Another suggestion, take the heater hoses off and back flush the heater core then using 5psi of air blow the heater core dry,that will get quite a bit of the total amount out. The system will not take fluid unless the engine is running. On my personal truck I jacked the rearend up as high as possible and took the hoses off and kept flushing and refilling untill all clear then went to draining. I strongly suggest the distilled water when going back. Goodluck,,Rick

 

i could not find a good way to drain mine without spilling all over