Loud bang, how do you do your fluid change? I understand there's a valve that can be opened to drain ou the old but how do your refill? Also, I seen mention in some DIYs about squeezing the hose that goes to the radiator. Coolant drain is the only maintenance I don't do because I don't get the procedure. Any suggestion explanation is appreciated.

 

Open the radiator cap. Place a shallow bucket under the radiator drain plug..open drain. Also disconnect overflow tank line from radiator neck and lower to bucket, allowing it to drain. Close drain plug..reconnect line. Refill radiator and overflow tank.

 

You better keep biting it. That is incorrect and if you knew anything about minerals in water and reverse osmosis treatments USING distilled water attracts the very thing you say is not happening. The less minerals the water has the MORE it tries to get them from the surrounding metal and parts in the vicinity which CAUSES corrosion. Try doing some research on RO treatments and learn something.

Your inherent CHEAPNESS is rearing it's ugly head again buying one bottle of coolant for less than $10.00 is not going to break anybodies wallet and if it ensures a long lasting engine why not it will save you money in the long run.

 

I do mine by opening the petcock on the bottom of the radiator and letting it drain (leave the radiator cap on when opening then once it's open take the cap off or you may get a lot of splash on you hand).

Once it's drained I then take my house water hose and put it in the radiator cap opening and let her rip and you can see more coolant coming out of the radiator out the petcock.

I use one liter bottle of coolant here not pre-mix and it works the best for me as I used to put in two bottles and my car actually ran hotter I found when I could only get one bottle and tried it.

Put the petcock back in and fill with the bottle of coolant and top off with tap water.

Now here is where I might be doing things different but it works really well. I start the car and let it idle with the radiator cap on and locked for about 10 minutes watching my temp gauge.

Sometimes the adding coolant and flushing the radiator will cause the thermostat to CLOSE so the new coolant and water mixture CAN'T circulate and since there is no water to take a reading from the gauge will show no movement even while the engine gets hotter.

If you just have a stock Fit just keep an eye on the idiot light for coolant and if it comes on and starts blinking shut it off.

Make sure the level in the overflow tank is up to the hot mark and then shut the engine off and here is the hard part WALK AWAY go have lunch or a beer or something and let the car cool off for at least an hour.

What happens is the heat in the engine will soon open the thermostat and the system will then suck coolant/water out of the overflow filling the system and eliminating any air in the system.

After trying all the advice I have seen in many places through trial and error I developed this method and it works every time for me as I do my change every oil change. After the first shock of seeing no temp yet on my installed gauge but the idiot hot light coming on I realized what was going on and tried this and it works.

Once it is cooled off I open the radiator and top off usually just a few inches in there then make sure the overflow is filled up to the mark and done...... well not quite I then drive around as normal then the next morning I check it while it is cold and sometimes the radiator need an inch or so of water and maybe a bit more in the overflow and now it's good until the next change.

ONE WARNING: I live in a warm place and never see freezing temps so it's possible you may need maybe a bottle and a half to have protection from freezing way down into the -30 range. Some garages will check the protection of your antifreeze for free so the first time you might want to do it to be sure you are protected to the temps in your area.

One little sidebar trick. The overflow tank sometimes gets all nasty looking inside and out so I have found this works well for cleaning the inside of the tank.

Take off the top bolt and remove the cap and hose from the tank and it should pull straight up and out.

The outside cleans nicely with scotchbrite pads and to do the inside just take a handful of SAND and or small gravel Yes I did say sand and gravel then grab the whole thing add maybe a liter of water and shake like a cocktail shaker. The coarser the material the quicker it will remove all the scum from inside the tank. Just shake it all around and you can see the scum disappearing. In harder to remove areas tilt the tank so the sand is acting right on the scum while you shake it.

Once all the scum it removed simply empty the sand and water out and flush with water until all the sand is removed and now you have a nice clean tank.

 

Yup +2

use MM except for extreme driving and conditions.

_

 

So, can anyone here tell me when their MM 5 indicator came on?

 

So...first time MM 5 came up was at 120,000 miles. Changed it.

MM 5 is coming up again at 168,000. I will change it again.

120K then every 48K apparently.

The Maintenance Minder does not actually calculate the schedule like Mercedes, et al.