Coolant issue

willise · May 12, 2012

Hi everyone,

I feel really stupid posting this, but here goes! LOL

When I got home from work last night around 3am, I decided to refill my windshield washer fluid. Unfortunately, being dead tired, I poured it into the coolant resevoir. I didn't notice until I was on my way to work today that the windshield washer light was still on. Then it hit me what I did. I filled the coolant resevoir to the top!

So my question is what to do now? Do I bring it back to the dealer and get them to flush the radiator? Can I just empty the resevoir and replace it with coolant? Does this void my warranty?

Thank for any help!

SmokedRam · May 12, 2012

If you ran the truck, you need to get your whole cooling system flushed...STAT.

GhostRam94 · May 12, 2012

What he said^^^^

Miami Son · May 13, 2012

No doom and gloom here. Windshield wiper fluid is mostly water, so at the worst all you did was dilute the coolant. There should be no lasting effects or voiding your warranty from this. Just have the system flushed and refilled at your earliest convenience. Expect the dealer to charge you, though, since it is not a warranty or routine maintenance issue.

iSlacker816 · May 13, 2012

Miami Son said:
No doom and gloom here. Windshield wiper fluid is mostly water, so at the worst all you did was dilute the coolant. There should be no lasting effects or voiding your warranty from this. Just have the system flushed and refilled at your earliest convenience. Expect the dealer to charge you, though, since it is not a warranty or routine maintenance issue.

Yea nothing serious will come from that, just have it flushed and all will be good.

willise · May 13, 2012

Miami Son said:
No doom and gloom here. Windshield wiper fluid is mostly water, so at the worst all you did was dilute the coolant. There should be no lasting effects or voiding your warranty from this. Just have the system flushed and refilled at your earliest convenience. Expect the dealer to charge you, though, since it is not a warranty or routine maintenance issue.

iSlacker816 said:
Yea nothing serious will come from that, just have it flushed and all will be good.

Thanks for the replies!! Your thoughts are the same as mine. I talked to a friend of mine who was a mechanic for GM and he said the same thing - just get it flushed and there should be no long lasting effects since it is mostly water.

I drove it about 30KM before I noticed the error, and haven't driven it since. I'll bring it to the dealer tomorrow and get it flushed out.

Thanks again for calming my fears!

Ocelot · May 13, 2012

I wonder if taking it to the dealer might be a bad thing? Dealers usually make notes every time they service something. I doubt the washer fluid would hurt anything, but if something goes wrong later, could they use that to void warranty repairs?

I might be tempted to take it to a good local shop for the flush so that the dealer doesn't know anything.

BlackedOutHemi · May 13, 2012

Or do it yourself. It's simple. Undo a plug, let it drain, and then run distiller water through it, drain it, and fill it up with coolant.

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TexasRammer · May 13, 2012

Ocelot said:
I wonder if taking it to the dealer might be a bad thing? Dealers usually make notes every time they service something. I doubt the washer fluid would hurt anything, but if something goes wrong later, could they use that to void warranty repairs?

I might be tempted to take it to a good local shop for the flush so that the dealer doesn't know anything.

thats exactly what i was thinking

Hemitom · May 13, 2012

really its not going to hurt the coolant too much,is. if you empty the bottle and refill it with coolant you should be OK.

ramhunter9 · May 13, 2012

Miami Son said:
No doom and gloom here. Windshield wiper fluid is mostly water, so at the worst all you did was dilute the coolant. There should be no lasting effects or voiding your warranty from this. Just have the system flushed and refilled at your earliest convenience. Expect the dealer to charge you, though, since it is not a warranty or routine maintenance issue.

Correction. 50%water 50% methanol if it was the blue stuff.

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SmokedRam · May 13, 2012

And if its the RainX stuff is like 35% Methanol...

willise · May 13, 2012

It was Rainx - the yellow stuff.

I'm going to get it into Mr. Lube tomorrow and get the coolant flushed and replaced. Otherwise, I'd have to wait a few days to get into a garage.

Miami Son · May 13, 2012

ramhunter9 said:
Correction. 50%water 50% methanol if it was the blue stuff.

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Methanol is also an ingredient in anti-freeze, so as I said, nothing to worry about.

ramhunter9 · May 13, 2012

Last time I looked a at a jug of antifreeze I did t see high **** amounts .

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ramhunter9 · May 13, 2012

Just looked at a jug. Seen nothing about methanol listed in the mix

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Trupiano · May 13, 2012

Good idea to get it flushed, you don't want any issues down the road. Moved this to tech section for ya BTW.

SmokedRam · May 13, 2012

IMO...I wouldnt care what the windshield wash was made of...$100 or so dollars today for a cooling system flush is a hell of a lot better than $1000+ six months from now, cause someone took a hunch that it wouldn't hurt anything and it did.

Miami Son · May 14, 2012

ramhunter9 said:
Just looked at a jug. Seen nothing about methanol listed in the mix

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Depends on the brand.
What is the ingredients of antifreeze? | ChaCha

My point was that there's nothing inherently harmful about methanol in the cooling system that would require a paniced reaction to this scenario. Like I said, I would have the system flushed and refilled at the owner's earliest convenience. No need to scare him as there's almost no chance he did any damage to his vehicle from this.

jdeere05 · Aug 7, 2012

i painted my cap blue....lol

Coolant issue

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