Rad help please

[ziggymini]

Rad on my Willy has two slight leaks so firstly I read the post about how easy it is to do yourself but I have not got a clue so what sort of labour time am I looking at paying someone & secondly apart from Renault & the ebay ads which go from about £80 upwards is there anywhere else to get prices from please?
Jaine

[Ahmed Bayjoo]

GSF sell the rdiator for 86£ plus we get a 10% discount
, if renault rad is not alot more id go for the renault item.

[white16valver]

Rad is piss easy, even for a muppet like me :D :lol:

May or may not have to take the bonnet and slam panel off, it depends how much room you have (not a lot usually lol).

Either way, there are a couple of bolts on the slam panel that hold the brackets that the rad is on to the slam panel. Undo these and put them in a safe place.

The water pipes at the top and bottom of the rad are held in place with evil clips (click here for picture (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/RSTurboPaul/Photo-0105.jpg)) that require a large pair of molegrips (http://www.toolspot.co.uk/products/Molegrips/Vise-Grip%20Curved%20Jaw%20Locking%20Pliers_t.jpg) to undo and work along the pipes, off the radiator bits that the pipes go over. You also need hands of a child to get to them so expect to swear a lot if the clips are at a funny angle lol
(I ended up getting to the bottom one by laying on my back underneath the car while it was on axle stands and unscrewing and removing the plastic surround round the rad to enable me to get the molegrips onto the clip and work it along the pipe.)

After that, undo the two bolts at the top of the rad that are holding the fan to the back of it and let the fan lean against the engine.

Work the bottom pipe off the radiator to drain the system, watch all the coolant piss out all over the floor lol (really should get it into a washing up bowl or something though as it's apparently not good for the drains etc)

Then the rad should just lift out.

Might then be worth disconnecting the header tank, rinsing it out, then flushing the system by putting a hose into the pipes that are left - do it backwards then forwards and hopefully it'll clear a lot of the crap out :)

Replace the header tank, replace the rad with the new one, connect all the pipes up and bolt everything back together, refill the system from the header tank with coolant (think it's £11 for 25 litres of Type D from GSF(??)) then should be job done 8)

[titcharoony]

easy (ish) to swop rad. you might want to put some rad seal through your water tank till you swop radiator as a precaution. check with some of the fellas on here that its ok to do that though.

[ae]

you might want to put some rad seal through your water tank

Don't use rad seal it'll block the water pump and make the system worse in the long run. Just keep topping it up until you get a new rad.

Andrew

[titcharoony]

see? told you to check. ;)

[Lunner]

you might want to put some rad seal through your water tank

Don't use rad seal it'll block the water pump and make the system worse in the long run. Just keep topping it up until you get a new rad.

Andrew

Just to re-iterate, DON'T EVER EVER EVER use rad seal

[titcharoony]

it sorted out my leak on my r5 gtt. thinking back it was stupid, the turbo is water cooled. DOH! is there any circumstance u guyswould maybe use it? non performance cars maybe?surely its not that evil or people wudnt use it. although i do recall a woman once telling me something had gone on her car to do with cooling, and the aa guy said: 'you didnt put that rad weld stuff in did you?'...anyway, is there any circumstance when you guys would use? or just steer clear altogether

[Matt_16v]

mat sound stupid question, but would you need to blled the system when changing rad?

[titcharoony]

i reckon you would, ull be bleeding it as you fill it. open up the bleedscrews and pour in the water. as water pisses out instead of air ur done. im thinking u would have to bleed as theres now air in the system?

[Matt_16v]

cool, where are the bleed screws? will be changing my rad in next few weeks.

Matt

[Coops]

you might want to put some rad seal through your water tank

Don't use rad seal it'll block the water pump and make the system worse in the long run. Just keep topping it up until you get a new rad.

Andrew

Just to re-iterate, DON'T EVER EVER EVER use rad seal

unless you have a 1991 polo with h/g failure, in which case do it! :lol:

[titcharoony]

think theres just one, and its on the passenger side of the radiator. offside if u will. i think its a black plastic screw. dont think theres any on the pipe work.
if you want to ensure full bleed and removal of air get a mate to hold the water tank as high as he can (shud try for this anyway when ur filling up the tank), and blow as hard as he can into the expansion tank as you open up the bleed screw. when he stops, close it. do this a few times and all the air shud be out.
not neccessary i dont think, but in R5 circles, this is a must lol.

[titcharoony]

duhhhhh 'nearside'. :)

[Lunner]

Nah not necessary in the clio, another bleed method is to run it with the cap off the expansion cap and just run the engine and top up as necessary.....never tried this but been told about it

[ae]

Also make sure your heaters on hot. This will help get any trapped air out of the system.

Andrew

[MAXIBOY]

it sorted out my leak on my r5 gtt. thinking back it was stupid, the turbo is water cooled. DOH! is there any circumstance u guyswould maybe use it? non performance cars maybe?surely its not that evil or people wudnt use it. although i do recall a woman once telling me something had gone on her car to do with cooling, and the aa guy said: 'you didnt put that rad weld stuff in did you?'...anyway, is there any circumstance when you guys would use? or just steer clear altogether

steer clear once had to scrap an engine when it came in for a head gasket and the block was solid filled with rad weld. if it does this to a block think what it does to your rad.

[ziggymini]

ooh you guys got carried away with your rad seal without reading my post properly, being a mere girly who can cook a mean chicken casserole, put make up on expertly & knows what cup sizes mean on a bra I would not even be attempting this myself so as previous what labour time am I looking at getting someone else to do it?
Mark Fish does all the repairs to my car but my Mini mechanic has offered as he is about £50 an hour cheaper!
Jaine

[titcharoony]

its not difficult, and replacing the rad and bleeding the system could be done definately within 2hrs, if uve no probs getting to all the pipes etc. a mechanic shud be able to do this in an hour. im not great with cars and i replaced my radiator, flushed the system, filled up and bled in about 2 hrs.

[titcharoony]

oh, and i too can apply make up expertly and i know what the cup size means...and the number that preceeds it ;)

[white16valver]

Bah, and girls go on about equality... ;)

Whereabouts are you? I'm sure someone on here could give you a hand with it :)

[titcharoony]

plus ill guess ur cup size!

[white16valver]

LOL

smooooth ;)

[titcharoony]

oh yes.