Hello all.
Picked up a 98 f-150xl 4x4 .kind of a basket case, but fairly cheap so i jumped on it..
160K on the clock..engine stills seems fine, quiet and powerfull...
Suposed history is "headgasket replacement" and then "mud" in the coolant system and loss of heat...
When i first peaked in there, my first impresion was some sort of stop leak, and also the color was brown /orange, very dense..almost to appear as if it had a dye in it..
I have since drained the system, pulled the radiator ,thermostat, main hoses, and ran water through the best of my ability..then used a flush kit and flushed several times...At this point i can flush clear, but then i couple of closed system cycles and th eorange stuff comes back with a cap full of mud..
I am thinking exhaust leak into the coolant some how???
at this point i have no evidence of coolant leaking into oil, and no sighns of coolant loss..

so this leaves me with the two theorys...1 stop leak still reamians in the system, or 2 some type of coolant contamination from within engine..

any advice on this would be greatly appreciated..
I would post a pic, but that doesnt seem to be an option here..
oh ya, almost forgot it is the 4.6 engine

thanks again
we2

 

could very well be a cracked head gasket or even worse head. at school we have a kit that is used to check for that. u run the engine for a while and then dip a strip in to the anti freeze. it will tell u if u have any gasoline in there or by products of combustion or anything. i dont kno where to get it but maybe a local shop around you has the same thing??

 

It's possible that the cooling system was massively neglected, to the point where the coolant broke down and formed deposits/rust in the hoses, heater core, radiator, water jackets, etc.

If the engine isn't overheating or running weird, you just may have to keep on repeating what you're doing now, until you get consistently clear water. I've had vehicles that literally took days to flush with tons of water before I got satisfactory results - and they were all never really 100% anymore anyways.

 

hey Racerf150-2, Quintin,
Thanks for the responses..THose both sound like possibilities and good ideas..
While i still have some time before the freezing weather aproaches i will continue to flush this thing out..i have the heater by-passed for now..while it wasnt totally blocked , i think it isnt flowing like it should..i have it by passed for now, and hoping to get the system clean before replacing..
The engine does seem to be running normal and at a good temp..so i will keep flushing for now..if the mystery substance keeps reapearing, maybe i will try that test to check for gas/combustion in the coolant..
Thanks gang

 

yup no problem .. keep us updated plz im curious haha

 

I just finished flushing my 2001 5.4L last week. I used a single can of prestone flush on one of the early flushes. I was pulling one of the block plugs each time I flushed. Even after the water flushed clear I never stopped getting little bb size flecks of rust looking flakes out of the block plug. The flakes look like rust but when squeezed in the fingers have the consistancy of a hard clay. The stuff doesn't seem to be very water soluable (sp?) but it was definitly giving the rinse water an orange-brown tint. I am guessing now that it is some type of precipitate from the anti-freeze.

I like Quintin's answer- keep flushing. Maybe try a few cans of radiator flush? On the other hand, maybe you shouldn't - the flush might loosen a bunch of it up and plug the radiator. Good Luck.

 

Hey Infernal,
Thanks for the response..
That sounds exactly like what i am finding...This is what makes me skeptical to change out the heater just yet...i'll keep flushing in the meantime..i fear the radiator and heater have been blocked up a bit already..even though i am getting a good reading on the guage, i know this stuff is in both
my radiator drain is slowly getting unblocked..i could pull the plug and not one drop was coming out...
until now i was assuming the previous owner had added a stop leak of some sort, but now you seem to describe what i am finding..
Interesting stuff...
thanks again..

 

Infernal, I should have asked...
I have reead a few things on line here , where they blame the muddy substance on a mix of diferent types of coolant..
Have you ever changed th etype of coolant your truck has used???

 

we287gn,
I am not sure how pure my mix is. I bought the truck new and after some 9 months or so realized that Ford had not given me the super-cooling radiator that was promised with the trailer tow package. It was a fairly good fight to get the dealer to install the upsized radiator - and I think that one of the service managers got fired over his inablity to "wave me off" on the issue. So the dealer may have been pretty angry over the issue. I do not know what antifreeze was put back into the truck. It may have been what was drained out or something fresh. It was long enough ago that I don't think the new coolant was being used yet - but I am not absolutely positive. Here is where I hang my head in shame - I had not replaced any of that coolant until last week. After looking at all those flakes of trash, I am now kicking myself for not doing it every two years as called for in the manual.

BTW - Be aware that if your manual calls for the old "green stuff" anti-freeze, that all "green stuff" is not the same formula as it used to be. The new extended life that Prestone sells is not the same formula that was originally used in your truck. Prestone changed the formula 2-3 years ago. The new stuff does NOT meet the Ford Spec ESE-M97B44-A that is called for in most of the old Fords. Ford still sells it as Motorcraft Premium Engine Coolant, and Zerex Original Formula meets the spec and Prestone has a product labeled "heavy Duty" that meets it (but Prestone told me you can only find it at tractor supply places).

 

Just got some green o reilly 50/50 will it be ok?

 

Read the jug and see if it will go down to the lowest temp your truck will experience. If it will, you'll be fine.

Going back to the sludge.. Sounds like oil in the water. Check your oil and see if there's any water in it.

 

Hey Chester8420
sorry for the delayed response..so far no evidence of water in the oil..i know what that looks like..not sure i have ever seen oil in the water, to say i would know to identify it...i tend to not think its oil, but i guess its a posibilty..
I will be doing another flush job this weekend(weather permitting), thiis time i will attempt to pull block plugs and see what i find...

 

This is what the goop looks like, sorry for the bad pics



hope it was ok to use the pics in this way,helps to paint a better picture

the second pic is the underside of the coolant cap

 

It certainly looks like oil to me, especially the texture you're describing.

Take the oil filler cap off the rocker cover, and look underneath. If you have significant water in your crankcase, you'll see a white, creamy deposit a little like Caesar dressing. That's emulsified oil.

Mind you, it's possible the oil's getting into the water, but not the reverse.

You need to try to figure out where the leak is, and if it's still happening, however, getting back to the filter idea, yes, you can buy them. I had one once that went on a heater line, I guess the theory is it'll filter ALL the coolant eventually, however, the more common ones instal in the upper radiator hose, where they get the majority of the coolant flow. You do need to remember to clean the filters regularly, or they'll clog and cause more problems than they solve...

This is the one recommended to me, I actually bought one but it wouldn't fit on my car at the time:

http://www.mako.com.au/auto/tefba.htm

There is another possibility - does the truck have an aftermarket electric cooling fan? There was a thread on here where something, I think it was a fan, had a poor ground and was grounding itself through the coolant, which was setting up an electrolysis reaction which was causing stuff to corrode prematurely. Any aluminum bolted directly to a dissimilar metal may cause issues like this, ideally you should insulate between aluminum and other metals with rubber, and use stainless fasteners.

 

Hey pjb999,
Thanks for the response and the link..
I have only pulled the dipstick for th eoil, i will have to check under the cap..
Also i should add, that the water (then turned to brown/orange stuff) has a chemical smell to it..Almost like a gas type smell or maybe a paint product type smell..
Also it is still equipped with the mechanical fan...
I have still yet to know what oil in a radiator looks like, i guess i was expecting bubbles of some sort..i also wonder what it would look like if the trans cooler sprung a leak???
tranny fluid level seems fine though..

thanks again, in the meantime ,..still at it ..serching for a way to clean this stuff out now that the radiator and core are both out..