aznromeo4u

I got a v6 accord 2000 ex 2dr. I am doing the coolant flush tomorrow. I read a lot of threads and watch a lot of videos.

1) Drain the coolant from the Drain Plug
2) Unscrew the drain bolt (may skip this step) Don't have jack stands, can't seem to find them. Only got my 5ton jack.
3) Wait for it to drain out.
4) Remove old coolant from reservoir, probably use a turkey baster for this.
5) After all coolant drain tighten drain plug.
6) Pour coolant into the radiator.
7) Fill up to max line in reservior
8) Start engine, wait for radiator fan to run twice then stop.
9) Fill reservoir up
10) Start engine and hit the rpm at 1500 for a few minutes.
11) Fill up reservoir and radiator

Is this right? This is basically what my owners manual say. But I seen so many videos of people pouring water into the radiator cap. I read some people pulling out their radiator hoses. What's the proper step to flush out most of the coolant?

94 accord typeR

that would be directions for radiator flush

the engine block has drain plugs and u might need to attach hoses to them. a V6 will have 2 drain plugs one on each side. I also recommend Prestone Super Radiator Flush. follow directions on bottle

aznromeo4u

Manual only shows one. kinda near oil filter for drain bolt. You sure there's two?

To flush do I just fill radiator through the cap with water? And then redrain? I am reading different things of people pulling the lower radiator hose and upper.

aznromeo4u

Alright, starting draining, jacked up the car to find the drain plug.



The blue thing is the oil filter. I see a bunch of screws there. And then there are allen bolts. I read somewhere that it might be the allen bolt.

Any advice greatly appreciated. It might not be any of these bolts either. But the manual shows a picture close to the oil filter.

aznromeo4u

I believe i fucked up guys. I changed my coolant temperature sensor, and thermostat at the same time. As I moved the thermostat, coolant spilled out...quite a bit and landed on some stuff.

I am trying to bleed the system. I burped the upper and lower radaitor hose. My radiator fan is not turning on.

How long do I let the engine right for? I tried it for 5 minutes with the cap off. Fan didn't come on. Upper hose was already feeling hot. Low was ice cold. Guessing thermestat didn't open. Put heat on high as well. Will go for 15 to 20 minutes to see what happens on idle. Then 15 minutes at 1500 rpm. Also no leaks that I can tell at the moment.

rockycat

Put the cap on and add to the over flow recovery and watch the temp gauge. System needs to pressure up. Watch close as heat is quick if the fan does not come on.

aznromeo4u

Okay fans finally came on. But now I notice some steam coming where the radiator hose is and around the spots where I spilled the coolant.

Car seems to be normal. Running normally. Temperature gauge hasnt gone above half yet. Howver I am just idling.

Damn it I got a coolant leak somewhere I think.

94 accord typeR

that is for four cylinder engines v6 has two block drain plugs. if u look at the "V" walls u should see a bolt and a spout. kinda like a outdoor water faucet. flush involves flushing. drain and fill is drain and fill

haynes manual has v6 info

aznromeo4u

Now I think I got a blown head gasket. Lol I dont know how I fucked up this bad. Just noticed my tailpipe has white smoke. A little drip of water. Car hasnt been running all day.

Can coolant get mixed up in the engine if I was filling the radiator up while car is jacked up?

Gonna test drive and check the oil to see if any milky oily stuff.

rockycat

If it is cool out just may be condensation.

aznromeo4u

Way too much smoke I think.

I drove it on the freeway, for about 3 minutes at 60mph, drove around the town for about 30 minutes at around 20 to 40 miles an hour. Car was normal, temperature was stable. Never went over half. Was about a quarter of the way which is normal. It went a little hotter when I park to check on car. Then went back down when I was driving. Didn't feel anything abnormal. This is around 8 @ night. Car was constantly smoking though from the tail pipe though. Same greyish, white color that I see on other cars driving down the street. Except mine was coming out constantly.

I know I did the drain and fill. I didn't flush the coolant. I mixed the blue with the green. But I don't know if that green is the honda green. Also it seemed really clean like sorta new. Maybe during a repair, someone replaced the coolant, because it look way too green to be that old. Not sure if they used the honda kinda of green. Would mixing some other green type, cause the car to exhaust a lot of fumes?

Also when I filled, I didn't start the car. I just filled it up until the rad couldn't hold anymore. Then I filled the reservoir to max. Bleed the system, by burping the hoses, and left the cap off. Then started the car for 5 minutes. Thought my fans were shot, since they didn't come on, which I posted about above. Then verified that the fans were working. I rev the rpm at around 1500 for about 5 minutes till fans came on after.

After I did my test drove, I checked the reservoir and it wasn't boiling or anything. Didn't smell any oil.

I do have a coolant leak. I think it's upper radiator. Don't think I pushed it up all the way. I noticed a few centimeter of space left on the upper hose that I can pull up, when I parked it earlier. Will pull it up tomorrow. Too dark to see anything right now.

When I replaced the thermostat, and coolant temperature, I don't think I plugged anything wrong. Car sounds normal. Don't think there was a leak. I did say some fluid from the thermastat housing came gushing out and getting the area dirty. I will verify if all my wires and hoses are plugged in correctly tomorrow.

If the car drives fine, is there still a chance of a blown gasket? What worries me is the excessive amount of smoke coming out of the exhaust.

aznromeo4u

After talking to my girlfriend she said, that she noticed smoke from the car for a while now. I'm thinking if it's a blown gasket, this has been a few days or a while, and not related to the coolant drain and fill that I did today. I did noticed when I pulled the reservoir today, it was piratically empty before the drain and fill. But it was clean, no goop or gunk in there.

If it's a blown gasket, almost 170k miles, I think I will just sell to my mechanic friend. Funny thing though, I been trying to fix the Hot Soak issue that I been dealing with for a while now, and this happens. I think I fixed it. Just replace the coolant temperature sensor and do a carbon clean up in the intake manifold and ports.

holmesnmanny

Relax and take a deep breath. If the car didnt overheat your head gasket is fine. You are really overthinking this.

You can compression test to further verify if you want.

holmesnmanny

Actually now im curious what precipitated your coolant flush ? Has it ever overheated previously ?

aznromeo4u

I wanted to do a coolant flush to replace the thermostat. Never been replaced since I got it at 80k. Don't remember if I replaced it at the 90k tune up mark. The reservoir was like 97% completely empty.

Just last week, all my spark plugs and one coil pack went out. Last replaced at 90k. And like I said I have almost 170k now. Not sure if that means anything.

Car has never over heated (atleast not that I noticed). I actually drove it about 400 miles, about 2 weeks ago.

Just remembered, before my spark plugs went out, about 2 hours before, I heard a loud train type screech driving through a tunnel. Thought i blew something then, was on the freeway like 5 seconds after. But car was fine. Also looked over and saw a train. So wasn't sure if it was the train or the car making that one loud screech. Haven't heard any loud screech since.

3 Weeks ago, I replaced the PCV valve and the rubber grommet. When I look at the smoke today, I'm not 100% positive if it's grey or bluish. Sorta hard to tell in the dark. Don't know if that has anything to do with it. Will check.

Yea will check everything tomorrow.

94 accord typeR

too funny

blue smoke would mean u need oil change but DONT DO IT. take ur car to a shop.

tons of white smoke is a blown head gasket. it will look like a smoke screen from a Bond movie. also cold weather causes white smoke. pull oil cap. if there is milky brown sludge then oil is mixing with coolant. hard to believe u ruined the head gasket this way but if so...

aznromeo4u

Sniff my tail pipe, not really sure what I am smelling. Lol.

Checked the plugs near the thermostat housing, pcv valve and hose, and seems good.

Upper radiator hose is leaking though. Its leaking right at the insertion near the radiator cap. Clamp is not holding tight enough it seems. Might explain why my reservoir is down from max line to a little above min. Biking to the local autozone to get new clamps. Other end of radiator hose is good.

Smoke from exhaust is still there. Definately greyish is white.

Oil cap is normal. Dipstick seems normal. Dont see any milky colors on it yet.

Trans fluid is sorta low will replace.

Any other reasons why smoke would be grey/white?

holmesnmanny

What exactly does this mean ?

rockycat

Some things are better done by experts is what i take from that

aznromeo4u

Alright guys I think its a blown head gasket.

I think my gasket blew the day all my spark plugs died on me at the same time which was about last week. So this was fairly recent. I started reviewing all my night driving videos for my rear view camera. Up to two weeks prior and noticed no smoke until I replaced my splug plugs.

Lucky I decided to replace my coolant or else I would have over heated the car further. Should have suspected something when i was emptying the reservoir of old coolant and it was empty.

Car is at 170k miles on original tranny. Needs to do suspension stuff and new waterpump soon. I am thinking I will not drop 1k to have it fixed. Will just use sealer. If this was at 90k I would get it fixed. Sucks I just dropped 400 bucks on new falkien tires. Just did my struts last summer, and already bought parts for other suspension work I was gonna do. I was in the process of tuning up the car.

Also dealing with the Honda hot soak issue is not worth it anymore.

MaTak87

That's my biggest problem working on my cars - the fear!

I hope you can resolve the issue! Looks like you're getting a lot of good advice here.

Murphy84

I had the same smoking issue and it ended up being a very obviously burnt valve. 350 or so for remanufactured head and whatever I spent on head bolts and gasket set from rockauto.com and it was fine. I got the head from national cylinder head I think since they had the best price and I would have only saved a hundred bucks with a valve job. My 99 accord ex has 214,000 or so miles on it and is fine besides possibly needing an abs hydraulic unit and the distributor may also need replacing.

I say if you can do the work yourself keep the car, it'll go another 200,000 or so miles with proper care and maintenance. Just make sure you have a machine shop pressure test the head if you go ahead with doing the gasket and there is no obvious damage to head or valves.

Murphy84

I also recommend doing timing belt and water pump if you're going to fix it. You'll already have enough stuff off to get at it I think. I don't have a v6 so I can't be completely sure how different the engine is set up.

aznromeo4u

Alright update guys,

It appears I don't have an a blown head gasket. I took it to a mechanic and they did a chemical test and said no trace of combustion gas coming from the radiator. And they said the test is pretty damn accurate.

Then they show me that radiator fluid is definitely leaking. They didn't tear it down since I told them I couldn't leave the car there long. They showed a coolant trail underneath the car. Then they showed me at an angle, where they suspect the coolant is leaking from. Looks like it's between the rear and upper camshaft covers (maybe near water pump pulley). Tiny spot to see. Is this a sign of a bad intake manifold gasket or valve cover gaskets?

I am gonna inspect in a few days, with some uv dye kit that I ordered online.

They also said its probably the water pump might be going bad. At 170k, I am pretty sure it is. I do notice some wetness on the timing belt as well.