mimog3

Hi There Honda Tech I'm A Newbie and Own a 2000 Civic EX with 160k on the motor.

I haven't seen any white smoke from the exhaust or milky oil in my engine or any other signs of a bad head gasket but was wondering if the attached video may say otherwise.

i had been reading that if you have bubbles in the coolant that this may be a failure of the head gasket. my engine hasn't overheated while driving but has twice just idling for like 15 mins after a drive. but i think that was caused by the thermostat not opening up because when i turned on the heat it went back to normal.

I've come to see if this is a possibility that the head gasket is starting to go.

http://youtu.be/mSWvBetxr-A

Blacknight117

iTrader: (1)

Couple obvious things....1) No coolant in the rad and 2) Coolant should be a neon green in colour, not brown...when was the last time you had the coolant system flushed?

mimog3

i did the coolant like 2 months ago, and i put an orange colored coolant in the radiator, don't know if that matters. what makes you think there isnt any coolant? in the video you can see it flowing

Blacknight117

iTrader: (1)

I think OEM Honda is blue, but the 50/50 stuff I used was the neon green colour.

How often do you add coolant?

mimog3

I Purchased the Car with 122K, and Changed it at 153K, i don't add any coolant since i didn't seem to think there was a loss of coolant

Blacknight117

iTrader: (1)

When the car is cold and you take off the rad cap, is the coolant all the way at the top of the rad? Also, is there coolant in the overflow?

mimog3

I Took the radiator cap off when cold and it shows some fluid not not all the way to the top, it looks like what you saw in the video. i had not realized that i was supposed to fill the overflow tank with coolant, i did that today. after it overheated while idling. so that might fix that issue.

Blacknight117

iTrader: (1)

Yea, fill to fill line on the tank.

Moe Junaid

the orange coolant isnt for honda you might wanna put the green one its has enthenol glycol

Blacknight117

iTrader: (1)

Just get the 50/50, green stuff, and do a complete flush. It will be safer that way.

mrspeedy69

Yeah you need to add more coolant than that. If you add more and it's still overheating at idle start checking to see if your fan is kicking on. Also, check the lower radiator hose to see if it's hot. If it's not hot then your thermostat isn't opening correctly.

94EG8

If you put orange Dex-cool in there, yes it matters, you will end up with a brown sludge instead of coolant unless you have thoroughly flushed the cooling system first.

EG92DX

Coolant should not flow at all when the car is cold. Coolant travels when the thermostat is open and the thermostat opens when the car reaches a certain temperature. If coolant is prematurely fed in to the engine you'll have problems like running rich , and long term damage by running the engine at an incorrect operating temperature , so you might have a malfunctioning thermostat.

You might of also had captured air in the coolant system and that won't make the car run right either and overheat it like a b**ch so try putting in a new t-stat , completely flush the coolant system and put some 50-50 in there and bleed till your sure no air is captured in coolant system.

Drama13

if there is air captured in the coolant system as long as the t-stat is operating properly just leave the radiator cap off and let it run until the t-stat opens and the air pocket will get pushed into the radiator then just bubble out. I just replaced the t-stat in my car today, just let it run for 30 min without the radiator cap and done.

DailyEk

Another trick, instead of leaving the radiator cap off to bleed the system just grab the upper hose when the car is off and when the radiator gets full the first time, slowly squeeze the upper hose, add more coolant, repeat until the system stops "burping". Just a small trick I learned.