I had a heater hose bust on me but i replaced it ,an used water i had at that time under the circumstances. Now its all water.
what amount of the water will i need to remove from radiator/engine to get it back to a good mix for when i add pure antifreeze .
1 an a half gallons maybe?
Also heater core has funny scent when on..Is that normal after such a big leak on the hose going along firewall an passenger side of engine .?

Thanks

 

Depends on engine. See fluid capacities sticky. https://dodgeforum.com/forum/2nd-gen...apacities.html

Drain radiator with front end lower than the rear and fill with it higher than the rear. If you're adding water to mix antifreeze concentrate, use distilled water. Tap water is no good for your cooling system. Feel your carpets to see if you have any moisture and see if your windows fog up when heat is on. Those are signs of heater core leaking.

 

Thanks. Unfortunately all i had access to earlier was tap water to keep it cooled after loosing much fluid when i was out an hose busted.
I added a lot!
Heater core seems back to normal now.
Drained radiator an it held around a gallon..
Hopefully i got all air our ,saw no more bubbles.
If there are still any tiny amounts of air will they work themself out as driving?
An what short term problems will the regular water i had to use cause?

 

To get the air out start with a cold engine. Jack up the front end, or put on ramps and run with the radiator cap off.

 

Weird I have used tap water with the coolant for 40 years with no problems. Now maybe if I had aluminum heads or block then tap water may be a bad thing all my engines and heads have been iron.

Yea sounds like you have a leaking heater core.

 

Didn't you replace a heater core?

 

No smell now .I guess it was all the over spray burning off an the empty core when i 1st started it .I flushed it out a few months ago too.
All i see now is solid water moving under cap when running and before stat opens..-since burping it.and no bubbles so i guess if theres any other in it they will work themselves up to that open air spot under cap.

Thanks

 

Yes I blew up around 3 or 4 the first 6 years I owned my Dakota but that was due to two things. first the 2.5 only used the efan for cooling now this usually works great unless your stuck in bumper to bumper traffic for 2 hours. The bumper to bumper traffic is the the second problem that blew up my rads. I started using a higher % of coolant and stopped blowing up my rads 50% didn't cut it.

The efan only turns on at 210 but by then the engine is very hot plus the efan was not very good on a 98 Dakota a rather crappy small fan. Thats why I did my 2000 efan conversion 5 years ago a much better larger efan.

One more problem a 98 Dakota had a small rad in 2000 the rad was made larger and better at cooling. My 2000 conversion also included the larger rad. One more difference in a 2000 is the rad was moved from inside the engine bay to the outside of the bay.

Very few people know this.