The coolant bottle should not be empty! Granted it is hard to see the orange in there thru the milky white plastic, but if you shine a light on it you can see where the level should be at.

 

Good. That is what i meant.

 

Well i guess it is ok. I only needed about 3/4 of a jug of that orange business to get it full. I watched the temp guage like a hawk during a hard drive with the ac cranked. On a side note, does this car not have a "dead zone" in the middle of the temp guage? My miata would hang at about 11 o'clock unless it got really hot. The srt-4, however seems to swing between uh i guess 8 and 10 o'clock all the time. It did this before my rad cap oops.

 

Mine is always around 200 when fully warmed but does fluctuate from a little under to a little over, say, 195 to 205 normally. It never stays put, unless I'm steady state cruising down the highway. Also, because you are watching it more, it will move more and..... when you add coolant to a system that had a lot of air in it, it will fluctuate more untill it burps the air out. You are most probably fine. I will also reiterate that the coolant reservoir should never, ever, be empty.

 

Make sure you turn your heater on full for awhile to let the coolant flow thru the heater core too. It will help eleiminate any air pockets in there.

 

Cool, thanks guys. I will watch the coolant reserve and check it with a flashlight from now on.

 

If the orange coolant is not available, DCX recomends topping off with clean water. Drain and flush that coolant ASAP. Engineering tells us mixing of the two can cause a sludgy build-up in the system. I would not use the Prestone that is compatible with both. Use the genuine Mopar stuff or equivalant.

 

Make that Distilled water top off, but by using it you are duluting your cold weather protection. Isnt it supposed to be a 50/50 mix of the two?

 

You misunderstood, in an emergency, top off with clean water, then as soon as possible, check and adjust coolant protection as necessary.

The reason behind distilled water is that tap water has minerals in it. The additives in the antifreeze get used up attacking the minerals in the water, then leaving less protection from the normal contaminates that would circulate in the system. Honestly, I have never gone thru the BS of using distilled water. As long as it is not water form the Hudson or Mississippi river, don't worry.

Well water may not be a good idea. BUT, in an emergency, it would do.