Service has flagged up that coolant in my 2002 model PD Passat has deteriorated. -15°C protection rather than -25°C from new.
Is a coolant change easy? I'm going to find a Haynes manual.
Last time I did this, Renault 18, bleeding the air out was tedious.
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I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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personally i wouldn't bother how often does it get to -15? but if you want to there is either a bleed screw on top of the radiator,or poor slowly into expansion tank put the heater on hot run it top it up slowly.
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Interesting - whenever I asked my trusted VW dealer about replacing the coolant mixture, they have always replied that the VW/VAG brew doesn't need replacing in normal circumstances. In the 133k miles with an Audi TDi, 160k with Passat 110Tdi, 75k in GolfIV TDi, if I remember correctly, there was never a problem with coolant quality (as reported in other threads, the Golf lost some due to a head gasket problem, but that's another matter). Good Luck!
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At 40K it was reported as good for -25°C but the recent one at 76K reported -15°C. The system has not been topped up, as far as I know, and so I assumed that there has been some degradation of the coolant.
Garage indicated that a 'top up' at £25 was on offer. So I think I'll syphon out the large header tank (1L plus?) and top up with decent strength mixture (60% antifreeze?) if I can find out the total coolant volume to do the sums.I reckon everything will mix up in time as there is a large bore pipe coming into the bottom of the tank.
The radiator is not even visible in my Passat so draining down would seem to be rather tricky.
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I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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The mk4 golf and bora have a drain valve at the bottom hose connection to the radiator, you can see this used to good effect here:
www.clubgti.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=80888&PN...6
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£25 to top up!
The latest VW OAT type antifreeze is supposed to be good for 10 years.
To bring it back to strength disconnect bottom hose (pull out clip and pull hose off). That will allow a couple of litres to drain out. Refit hose and refill with VW-Spec (from dealer or ECP, GSF) mixed at 50% with distilled water. Empty and refill header tank also.
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Bottom radiator hose clip is in a very confined space.No confidence I could get to it OK. Emptied header tank by undoing spring clip with a pair of Mole grips.
Topped up with 2 litres of fresh 'G12 plus' coolant at the maximum recommended concentration.~60/40.
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I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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