Set fire to my XJS..................................

[Brakebuster]

well , thats what i thought while it was ticking over on the drive and i was cleaning the leather


all of a sudden there were strange noises and lots of ' smoke ' . OH ******** ****** ****** as i turned off the ignition and ran like **** to the garage and grabbed the nearest fire extinguisher , ran back to the car saying **** ........****....... ****

and proceded to aim the extinguisher under the car and round the wheel arches, as by this time lots of smoke and steam was pouring from the wheel arches and bonnet sides ..............

then , i managed to pop the bonnet and open it with the extinguisher poised for the inevitable fire


BUT

it was all steam !!!!!!

and floods of coolant was coming out from under the car

panic over , .............well almost

four watering cans full of cold water later i began to relax and hope the engine didnt cook in the few seconds of dropping its water , as i kept filling and filling hoping that the cold water would bring down the temp quickly



after all the excitement , the reality , MOT tomorrow , bugger...........


what was the damage/ cause of what had just happened ,

the main coolant mess was at the back of the engine, and at first i thought it was the left side rail , or the extra air valve , but no,,,,closer examination found that this is where the flow and return for the interior matrix is located, top pipe ( return ) seemed fine, but couldnt see anything wrong with the lower hose to , so , with the system as full as i could get it i turned the car over , and a minute or so later water was dropping down the back of the engine off the bell housing onto the floor ,
of all the pipes to go , it had to be the most inaccessible one in the whole car !!

luckily , i had some hoses ......


and four hours later, it was all fixed , but

i also found that the cabin heater valve was corroded shut , and was inoperable, i manually ported the valve and put it back into the circuit wide open , and ordered a new one on the net ( £60 all in )

the car was filled with coolant , and let run and get to temperature, no leaks so far


i REALLY did think it was on fire for a second though.........


now i'm cold and tired , and have bruised and sore hands and wrists from getting into all the tight spaces , i formed a tool from a jack handle ( the bent hook type ) for pulling the hose onto the spout that is right behind the B bank valve block...this is where the other one split

i will get a picture up later if i can be motivated , lol

the E.N.D

BB

[robv12]

errrmm, oh SH** but a lucky escape hope all is well

having had the same thing with a 6.0 V12, I know the blind panic that sets in, luckily I pulled mine out of the garage to wash it, left it running, went to fill the bucket, came back round the corner of the house to clouds of acrid smoke TWO fire extingishers did the most of the job, the fire brigade turnd up 25 minutes later bless 'em " we couldn't find you", covered it foam and cut the battery cables "to be safe" despite my pleas, worst of it was this was Sunday morning, i only bought the car Saturday morning and drove it here from London, so at my place for less than 12 hours, luckiliy i had moved it outside , imagine if had gone up inside with all the others. by the way the fire Briagde packed up and left, so I had an immobile two ton car with a burnt out front end, across my garage blocking all the other cars in the garage and the driveway, thsnk for you help once more Trumpton!!!

BB, lucky escape, hope all is well, V12 is ok with stuff like that , there is plenty of coolant, they only suffer if the get very very hot, you should be ok I reckon

[Brakebuster]

Damn,,,,,,,, at least mine only turned out to be steam.........


what do you recon to this ' waterless coolant ' stuff

worth the investment ? . there is no pressure buildup , as the boiling point is twice that of water , or so......



BB

[robv12]

tbh. not looked at it or even thought about, worth investigation I guess, wonder if anyone else has used it

there is a PH thread here about it


http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=1208909


look like Evans are the main suppliers??

[J44EAG]

Heck, it all happens when I go away for a couple of days!

Glad it was nothing worse, Vince. Should have given me a shout. I was in Gloucester yesterday.

Just hoping my old V12 doesn`t have a hissy fit and go up in smoke or steam. My worst problem currently is my floating workshop which sank again the other day!! One moment it was there, the next moment, GONE. Recovered with a large pump once the tide went away.

Mike

[piman]

Hello BB,

it's not about boiling point, but expansion, the normal coolant is not boiling in normal circumstances. A few on the Pistonhead's forum also seem to relate it to boiling point. Waterless coolant expands less than water for a given temperature rise.
I personally don't feel the advantages, (reduced corrosion and some reduced pressure) is worthwhile on a normal road car; it's popular amongst Vintage car enthusiasts because so many have extremely rare engines which are not easily replaced.

Alec

[BigCatXJS]

There is a relevant thread on this elsewhere;

http://www.jaguarforum.co.uk/f39/coolan ... 51084.html

I'm linking across rather than reblogging as there are some useful links in the above post.

Thanks, Rich.

[bokapita]

what do you recon to this ' waterless coolant ' stuff

Not a good idea, IMO. The coolant system has to be 99.5% dry of the old coolant (ie impossible in a V12 withoout removing engine from car and heater matrix from dash) if not your engine will be full of jelly. Although the car will not boil, the stuff actually has to have only a 2 or 3 PSI radcap, not the normal 16 PSI or so. Therefore the engine will be running hotter than with the normal antifreeze - even though not boiling. This is not a good plan for a V12 Jaguar engine. If you have a hose go, you HAVE to refill with the same stuff, any water mixed in turns the whole lot to jelly. So you have to carry around a large amount of it, or be trailered home.

[555ttg]

Evans sells a product that you run through the system that eradicates any water/old coolant residues, thus removing the problem. Evans says that their system will run with up to 5% water/coolant residue, but obviously recommends using their other product to avoid this. I have been researching this product for a while, as I am considering using it in my 1937 Alvis 4.3 dhc. Everyone I have spoken/corresponded with that uses the product, swears they'll never go back to water/glycol coolants. My reason for considering this, is both from the reduced pressure aspect as well as the higher boiling point (333 degrees, I think?) I have never heard of the Evans product, turning into jelly, perhaps that was a different brand?

[PaulGover]

what do you recon to this ' waterless coolant ' stuff

...
Although the car will not boil, the stuff actually has to have only a 2 or 3 PSI radcap, not the normal 16 PSI or so. Therefore the engine will be running hotter than with the normal antifreeze - even though not boiling.
...

Wrong physics - it's not water, so its expansion with temperature will be different. What controls the engine temperature is not the radiator cap, it's the thermostat, and that should be unchanged.

That said, I see no reason to replace perfectly good and cheap water with something horribly expensive. Leaks are usually caused by ageing hoses; if a hose goes on holiday, with a water-filled system, it's no issue to top it up, but with this fancy stuff you'd need to take however many gallons spare with you

[PaulGover]

... Evans says that their system will run with up to 5% water/coolant residue, but obviously recommends using their other product to avoid this.
...

My tests show a standard drain and refill cycle on a V12 leaves 30% of the old water behind. So you'd need to run this magic stuff through three times to get below 5%.

Preparatory to changing from blue to orange antifreeze in my V12, I flushed the system with Holts finest, and then 4 changes of water, which by my calculations leaves less than 1% of flushing agent/old antifreeze/grot.

Also, don't forget to clear out the overflow tank behind the LHS wheel arch; otherwise a few expansion/contraction cycles will quickly contaminate your coolant with very aged and oxidised gunge.