I put the mityvac with an adapter on the radiator and pumped until I drew 25" of vacuum, problem eliminated, it burped it for me. Note that it took me ten minutes of pumping and a sore grip to get it, but I got the trapped air out. Still need to jack it up on one side, pretty far actually, in my case I just parked it in the ditch rad cap side up.

Hey You, I run a 175 t-stat, the truck does warm up like normal and holds 175 perfectly but for a 15 degree difference the heat sure is worse, any ideas on backflushing if access to a hose is about impossible when its 4 degrees outside?

 

Can you explain the mityvac set up a little more to me please, I'm not picturing that. I've bled breaks with that before but not a radiator. I've got a standard set of car ramps maybe a foot tall, could I just drive the passenger wheel onto one to get enough height to burp it?

 

Another question i have, i've backflushed a 98 civic once and it required the temp control to be all the way open thus opening the heater core (cable on civic you can watch it open). "if" my automatic control that opens that door is broke, (i can't see if its opening) and i try to back flush with the door not open what kind of damage is potential or am i not thinking this out correctly?

 

No damage at all. The door just redirects air flow, the heater core always has coolant flowing thru it.

 

Alright updates, replaced the thermostat went with just a stock temp. put that in, set up the back flush for the heater core but only had a cold water source, ran it, came out clear?? wasn't expecting that. did it a few times same result so i hooked all the hoses back up, filled up the radiator. drove passenger side wheel up on a ramp and ran with radiator cap off for quite a while system didn't really "burp" much, again not what i was expecting. Only had to add a little bit of coolant one time to bring in back up. Finished with the radiator capped it off then drove home with a little trip on the interstate 75mph probably 15 mile total trip and that's after it running half hour for the burping.
Results! the heater did blow eh warm air, heater on full blast never really got hot just stayed warm. went home, re-re-checked the set up for leaks or obvious snafu appears all good. let it cool down then came back checked the system coolant level, negligible difference in coolant level.
Consequences: the engine never registered above maybe 160. the thermostat i got was labeled the 192. Personal preference i'd rather run 192, so for me its running to cold.
Questions: Did i install the thermostat wrong and it get stuck open now?! Second, should i be surprised that my back flush came out clear really quickly? I assume i'm going to want to burp the system a few more times a couple more times through the week the chances of me having somehow not let air back in are very very low in my opinion.

 

Well, with the mityvac the cooling system cannot be totally full, you need about a quart worth of space or it won't displace enough liquid to burp the trapped air. Start out with it NOT running and cold. Use the big rubber cone adapter and a bit of grease to shove it down the rad neck. Pump away until you get 25 inches of vacuum. Start the truck, almost immediately it will burp. continue pumping until it burps again, don't let the truck run very long, two or three minutes is fine, and yes I did this at a rather severe angle to aid the work.

My heat was ok in Louisiana, but it's never been that great either so meh. I think I'm just going to end up doing a heater core on it...I recently moved to WI and it's painfully obvious my heat is terrible.

I watched the ETC video, and he used what I think is CLR to clear the heater core, this is a good thing because it actually doesn't affect aluminum. You could try using a standard off the shelf flushing agent from the parts store and pour it right down the heater hose, I may do it myself since it's that or take it apart for replacement.

 

Best practice is to boil the thermostats before you install them so you'll know if they're bad or not.....

 

Army_Greywolf, to what are you refering when you mentioned a ETC video?
Stewie01 that will be my new standard procedure now lol.

 

Are you getting an ocean noise from inside the cab? like a swishing sound from behind the dash?

 

I definatly noticed that sound before the weekend but after i havent really paid attention or been in it that long to notice.