Coolant Flush......Based on Miles or Years?

[dkryan]

2009 Honda Civic with 14,965 actual miles

Mother-in-law owned; 2,500 miles per year. I take care of the maintenance, which has been minimal, thank you.
Her biggest issue has been the battery (or batteries at this point) owing to only a few trips per month on average.

I just changed out the OEM brake fluid and power steering fluid and I was wondering what to do with the OEM coolant , if anything.

 

[mclasser]

Pretty sure the factory fill coolant has a life of like 10 yrs/120K miles. Does her Civic have the MM?

 

[Quest]

factory fill for both Toyota and Honda are first 10 yrs. YOu can then do a drain and fill and keep things up every 3 yrs.

my wifey's 2004 camry has pasted 214k /10yr mark and still on original factory pink coolant. I'm gonna do drain-n-fill later this summer and take it from there.

2009/14k is way too soon to worry about coolant. So long as your water pump doesn't leak, you just keep on driving.

Q.

 

[Donald]

Think about a battery maintainer. You can get one with ring terminals and then the lead portion can be left permanently connected. Easy to hook up.

After 8 years I would do a drain and fill of the radiator every other year.

 

[dkryan]

MM?

It has an oil life monitor, unlike my five year newer Altima.

 

[Merkava_4]

If you see pieces of debris sticking to the inside walls over the coolant reservoir, it's time to change it.

 

[901Memphis]

Yep, noco makes a nice battery maintainer. The G750 or G1100 if you want a little more juice. Cheap and reliable.

 

[eljefino]

Just sitting there, you're going to have some chemical reactions using up corrosion inhibitors.

But, running, you can have static electricity causing galvanic corrosion.

I'd go for whatever milestone leads to better maintenance.

I'd do the timing belt at around the 12-14 year mark, BTW.

 

[Greasymechtech]

I'd change it, or at least half of it every 5 years.

The other option is to get a coolant analysis and see how its holding up.

The manufacturer is hoping that your water pump, radiator, or heater core will fail before then anyway requiring new coolant after repair.

 

[oilpsi2high]

GM is 5 years or 100k, whichever comes first. 10 years is just insane.

Do a drain & fill. Your water pump will thank you later.

 

[powayroger]

I have 08 Civic. I put 15,000 on it a year. I chnaged the coolant at 90,0000. AT 92,000, had a radiator leak and the found out about the crack head recall and got a neew block but had to pay for teh raditor.

 

[HTSS_TR]

Originally Posted By: oilpsi2high
GM is 5 years or 100k, whichever comes first. 10 years is just insane.

Do a drain & fill. Your water pump will thank you later.

I changed coolant in my 2004 Honda S2000 I bought in Nov 2013 last winter. After 11 years and 50k miles the coolant drain out was in excellent condition, it could be used for another 4-5 years easy.

 

[Greasymechtech]

How can you tell if the coolant is in excellent condition and can be used for 5 more years without an analysis? By the look of it?

 

[901Memphis]

http://www.napaonline.com/Catalog/CatalogItemDetail.aspx/Coolant-Test-Kit/_/R-FIL4106_0006474138

 

[Greasymechtech]

So, how was that nitrite, PH, molybdate, SCA level.... in that Honda coolant?

 

[oilpsi2high]

Originally Posted By: Greasymechtech
How can you tell if the coolant is in excellent condition and can be used for 5 more years without an analysis? By the look of it?





Exactly. You can't tell just by the color.

 

[HTSS_TR]

Originally Posted By: Greasymechtech
How can you tell if the coolant is in excellent condition and can be used for 5 more years without an analysis? By the look of it?

Drained out coolant didn't have any contamination, the color was about the same as new. By the look of it I felt confidence that it could be used for several more years.

Also, looking into the radiator though the cap, the top of radiator was shinny as new.

 

[Bear]

Originally Posted By: Greasymechtech
How can you tell if the coolant is in excellent condition and can be used for 5 more years without an analysis? By the look of it?


You can check conductivity.
From my recent searches on coolant (see page 2):
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/1574012/2