My car has been heating up lately... and i noticed that inside my radiator (at least the view from the top when u take the cap off) that there is some kinda of white gunky build-up all caked to the insides... i'm assuming this is bad, but what does a new clean one look like so i can compare?!

I know... i need a new radiator... right?

 

sticky, mud like green stuff from radiator? you probably want to check the head gasket dude, it's gone.

dont drive it around until it's fix or you'll wrap the head

you are burning coolant too huh? white smoke come out of the muffler? smell like gas?

milky, oily coolant??

 

he hit it in the head.

yeah, head gasket, then get your cooling system cleaned.

 

after you got it fixed, get it flashed and do a oil change

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by iam7head &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">sticky, mud like green stuff from radiator? you probably want to check the head gasket dude, it's gone.

dont drive it around until it's fix or you'll wrap the head

you are burning coolant too huh? white smoke come out of the muffler? smell like gas?

milky, oily coolant?? </TD></TR></TABLE>

Umm... nope, none of those symptoms at all... the coolant is clear orange (i use the orange prestone stuff) and there is no sign of mud-like substance. Not burning coolant at all, no white smoke or smelly fumes. Also, it's seems i'm not losing any coolant cause i've been checking it everyday lately...

The thing is that when i do look inside, it's caked... imagine that the radiator is like a room and the door to the room represents the coolant cap. When i open the door (cap) to the room (radiator), the walls inside the room are all coated with a white-ish substance, seems to be caked on?! Get it??

So the question is... is this normal? Is this causing the coolant to not get good contact with the inner walls of the radiator, hence causing it not to be able to cool down properly?!

Hope this explains a little bit... but i appreciate the head gasket deal, probably need to look at that too...

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by dclub01 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
(i use the orange prestone stuff) </TD></TR></TABLE>
How long has that orange stuff been in there? Maybe that stuff is screwing it up.

 

if you drain the radiator, or if you get a lil coolant off the radiator enough so you can see the metal without any liquid in between, is the stuff in there? like paint on metal?
I've seen this in cars with only water.

 

If you want to rule radiator out just go get your radiator cored. When I had that done on my mazda truck (at 265k) it only cost 50 dollars when I pulled it out myself. I doubt yours would be much more than that. Especially in a car with over 200k you really should get it cored. Regardless there is probably a lot of crap built up in there.

 

flush the system if the problem returns then I would be worried....

 

does it looks like this?


Larger pic (copy and paste this link on your address bar)

http://www.imagestation.com/pi...g.jpg

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by GZERO &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">does it looks like this?


Larger pic (copy and paste this link on your address bar)

http://www.imagestation.com/pi...g.jpg</TD></TR></TABLE>

yeah, kinda like that... notice the white caked to the walls... although it doesn't look that bad as the one pictured... any suggestions?

 

i doubt is the radiator then, but maybe you can take it out, and take it to a raditor shop and have it cleaned and then clean the cooling sys with distilled water and then add coolant (HONDA!!) to it, if you still have cooling problems then is either Thermostat, Water pump or any of the switches.