I put a new water pump on my truck last week. Actually I had to put 2 new water pumps on my truck. The first one I bought had leak problems. When I did it I removed the lower radiator hose to drain the radiator and more coolant came out when I took off the old pump. When I put it all back together and refilled the cooling system, it took a whole gallon of green antifreeze and half a gallon of distilled water to fill it up.

Then when I did the second pump the next day, I put another whole gallon of green antifreeze and about 1 or 2 quarts (maybe a half gallon) of the coolant/antifreeze mixture from the first water pump job. I had drained a lot of it into a clean drain pan when I removed the lower radiator hose the second time, so I just re-used it. I did have to add about half a quart more distilled water over the next 2 days to bring the level up where it should be at the bottom of the radiator hose fill neck. I guess that's from the cooling system burping the air out.

I am wondering/worrying that I do not have the right coolant to water mix ratio now. I know the ideal is 50/50 mix, I think it is probably 60% coolant now. When I look down the radiator fill neck the coolant is kind of dark green, I think before I did the water pump the coolant/water mix was lighter green color. Right now for some reason my truck seems a bit slower when it is cold. After it warms up or like today when it was 70 degrees out it runs fine. It's not overheating and the temp gauge is right where it should be when the engine is warm.

It gets hot here in the summer, 8 or 9 months out of the year it's 85 degrees or higher. 95 to 100 degrees during July thru September. I don't want to boil the coolant and blow the head gasket or worse. At this point I am tempted to just take it to a shop and have them do a flush and fill with a machine. It costs a lot but at least then I will know the mixture is right. If anyone has any info/ideas on this I am all ears.

Thanks.

Jimmy

 

My truck seems to have more anti freeze than water. I had a hard time getting the proper mixture after replacing my water pump. Just have to work with it. Tests at about -37 and around +264, don't remember exactly. Get a tester to check it, they are cheap at Walmart, Advance, etc.

 

The easiest way to eliminate all doubt is to drain it, dispose of it, and buy new antifreeze. Mix it 50/50 before dumping it into the cooling system (or buy premixed). The easiest way to mix it yourself is to have an empty jug of antifreeze, fill it half way with antifreeze from the full jug, and then fill them both the rest of the way with water. Then you have 2 gallons of 50/50 mix. You'll need 3.5 gallons (14 qts.) of 50/50 mix to fill your 2001 3.9L, according to the 2001 FSM.

To obtain the empty jug of antifreeze if you don't have one laying around; since you are going to need to buy 2 gallons of the stuff anyway, dump one of the gallon jugs in there straight, and then fill it with water and dump that it. That will result in 2 gallons of 50/50 mix in there, plus you will have the empty jug to work with to mix up two more gallons of 50/50 (you'll end up using about 1.5 gallons of it). You'll have some left over if you need to add any in the future, and since it will already be a 50/50 mix, you won't have to worry about screwing up the ratio.

 

Thanks for the replies. Looking at the coolant through the fill neck, the mixture has to be off. It's just too dark of a green color.

I think what I will do is just remove the lower hose (again) and drain some of the coolant mixture out, then measure what I drain out into a an empty gallon water jug to be sure I drained out just one gallon of the mix, and put back any amount over a gallon. Then I will add a gallon of distilled water. I think that should bring it back to a 50/50 mixture. I do have about half a gallon of pre-mixed 50/50 if I need to top it off.

Thanks for the help.

Jimmy

 

I would get a tester. Remove some of what you think is primarily anti freeze and keep it. Add water to refill as necessary. That way you have a more concentrated mix to refill if necessary. Up to you, good luck.

 

I went today at lunch and bought the Peak antifreeze tester at a nearby AAP. I came back to work and let the truck cool for 3 hours, went out in the parking lot and checked the coolant on my break. The needle on the gauge pegged, it went past the mark for freeze protection to -45 degrees and it went past the mark for boiling protection at 265 degrees.

At 50/50 mixture it should have stopped around -34 degrees and boiling at 255 degrees. Seems to me the coolant to water concentration is way off. I am going to pull the lower rad hose tonight after the truck cools off when I get home, drain a gallon of the coolant/water mix out and add a gallon of distilled water, and check it again after that. I do not want any overheating problems. And it seems the engine is way too cool, the heat takes longer to get hot and my MPG is down. Something is off somewhere and I believe it's the coolant to water ratio.

Any further ideas or info is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Jimmy

 

I'd flush the whole system,.. Heater core and, Rad.
Then go with your 50/50 mix.
Make sure there is no air-pockets when done.

 

Well I hope I have it fixed now. I drained out the radiator and what came out of the pump by disconnecting the lower radiator hose. I caught 95% of what I drained out in 2 clean drain pans, measured it into an empty gallon antifreeze jug, filled it up and had maybe half a pint more left over.

I added a gallon of distilled water and ran the system to burp out the air. I had the front of my truck up on jack stands and ran it 4 times with the heat on full blast to circulate the coolant and get the thermostat open and burp the system. The heater got hot pretty fast, just like it did before I replaced my water pump last week. The heat was also good and strong, same as before. It also didn't have near as much condensation out the tail pipe as it did last Monday after I had installed the new water pump, even though it's probably 45 or 50 degrees tonight and I had the garage door open the entire time.

I kept checking the coolant level in the radiator fill neck and kept adding water and some of the mix that I had drained out tonight. I got it to where the needle on the tester points right at -34 or -35 degrees on the freezing side of the tester. Turn the tester over and it reads right at 265 degrees for overheating protection. According to the tester, that corresponds to a 50/50 mixture of water and coolant. This was when the coolant in the radiator fill neck was warm, not cold. I let it cool off nearly completely and checked it then, the readings were lower. But when I let the engine cool only until it had semi-lukewarm coolant it read right where it should be. I checked it 4 separate times and I believe the coolant to water mix is correct now. That's what I am going with and I am not messing around with it any more. The color of the coolant is a lot better now too.

Now another problem showed up tonight. I have a pulley or a bearing somewhere on the front of the engine that is squealing. I thought maybe I had splashed some water or coolant on one of the pulleys etc up front, but it still squeals even after a 1 mile test drive around the block and back. The faster I go the faster the squeal is. I dunno what it is. I pulled the belt part of the way off and the alternator, idler and tensioner pulleys all turned fine by hand and made no noise, but that is the area where the squeal is coming from. I was too tired to completely R&R the belt again tonight. It was squealing in the garage at idle while I was checking the coolant but when I got back from my test drive it was just barely squealing at idle in front of the house, but would squeal again if I gave it the throttle.

The belt is a year and 20K miles old I guess. The squeal could be the belt, but it wasn't doing that before tonight when I changed the coolant to water concentration. The edges of the belt are a bit frayed with short little threads sticking out here and there, that might be from the play in the old water pump pulley bearings. Maybe the new water pump is squealing because there is less coolant to lubricate it now.

The belt I have now is a Carquest belt, and I can usually get 2 years out of a belt. If it still squeals tomorrow after I get to work I'll try a new belt and go from there.

Thanks to everyone who replied and helped me out on this. I do appreciate it. I sure hope my coolant and water pump problems are over. Now I just have to fix this new squeal.

Jimmy

 

Squeal in mine was the belt. Could also be the tensioning pully, they will tend to cause some noise.

 

Engine or belt or whatever it is squealed all the way to work this morning. There was no noise when I first started up but about 2 blocks from my house it started chirping/squealing again. It's pretty loud and increases in speed (but not pitch) as the RPM's go up. At 2000 RPM and 70 MPH on the highway it sounds like a bird chirping under the hood.

I have the old belt that I took off last year. It's a Napa belt and I keep it in my truck for a spare. I'll put that one on before I leave work. If there is no squeal I'll drive it for a few days first to be sure before I go buy another belt.

I hope that's all it is. The tensioner seems OK, I can't move it by hand without a wrench and the belt runs OK. Idler pulley turns easily, runs smoothly and has no noise or grinding/rough feel to it. I really can't see how I could have caused a misalignment problem when all I did was take the belt off and put it back on again. Truck had no belt or pulley noise at all before last night. Ironically, I took the belt off last night only because I did not want to spill any water or antifreeze on it and cause it to slip or squeal.

Thanks.

Jimmy