radiator replacement

raise vehicle unscrew radiator drain plug and place pan under to catch liquid. remove surge tank cap
Fill: close drain plug and lower vehicle must be level. loosen vent screw on radiator. add mix of 50/50 dex-cool to surge tank to bottom line of bleed nozzle on tank. when coolant stabilizes add until coolant is at black arrow on pic. start engine and verify coolant is at black arrow after starting. run at 2500 rpm for two minutes then let idle shut off engine and remove surge tank cap check level and add to cold mark if necessary install surge tank cap and rinse away any coolant on engine and compartment. then recheck in two days after driving. see pics

Great. Thank you for the detailed narrative and especially the pictures. I now know where to find the drain plug and vent screw. I appreciate you getting back to me so quickly.
I will update you when I perform the task.

I finally was able to get to this, this morning. Everything went exactly as you instructed. I am grateful for your help. The pictures were very helpful along with your detailed narrative. Being all we own are GM vehicles, I hope I get you next time I have a repair question. Thank you!

all of our people are well qualified even if you dont' get me

Hello HMAC300,

Firstly, thank you for your response. Your knowledge and diagrams are excellent. Very simple to follow and easy for the average lamen to understand.

I have a follow up question in relation to changing out the coolant.

After following this procedure I noticed that I only used 2.5L of coolant to refill the system. The manual states that the cruze takes 7.5L.
Obviously the rest of the coolant is trapped somewhere between the engine block(probably behind the thermostat) and the heater core/pipe work Etc.

Is there any way of draining this other 5L of coolant from a dump valve somewhere...?

Or is it more a matter of filling with water, running (driving) with heater on for 30mins and then draining and flushing ???

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Adam

you can always pull the lower radiator hose to drain the system it may have not drained properly if the radiator cap wasn't removed. also was it more than a gallon that was installed as most antifreeze comes n a gallon which if you only took 2.L it would onlybe half of the container.

Hi.
I pulled the radiator drain plug (level with the lower hose) and had the lid off of the overflow tank. Which promptly drained.
I am in Australia, we use 5L tubs. (1.25 gallons ish) it took roughly half. So 2.5L.

As i said before, the manual says 7.5L of coolant. The overflow tank runs directly into the pipework that runs from the water pump block to the heater core.

Surely the car doesn't require lifting/tilting to drain the fluid properly ??

it shouldn't try running engine with cap off and see if it will take more fluid when it heats up or did it just drain like 2.5l out of engine? sometimes they may take more when heated up or it may have an air lock in the systemif you didn't loosen screw in second pic then it's got an air lock and you probably won't get any more in it. follow first reply with pics like I sent and make sure car is level.

Hello Hmac3000,
Thanks for all your help.
It was an air lock on refill due to not loosening the top radiator plug.
Funny how something so simple can cause so much grief.
Cheers again. Greatly appreciated.
Adam

THANK YOU! I just recently replaced the thermostat on my 2012 chevy cruze (w/~36,000 mi) and could not get the cab to heat up. In all the other posts and videos that are supposedly for 2011-2014 Cruzes they mention the radiator cap as the solution to this (there are other things too such as removing and lifting the overflow tank etc but this is by far the easiest way). The 2012 LS does not have a radiator cap. The problem as described previously was air lock after refilling with new fluid. When facing the car head on it's a small plastic screw vent on the top left of your radiator. Loosening that alleviates the air lock and after idling for ~15 minutes I got heat again. The problem I originally identified was the engine light was on. Autozone read the code and it indicated a bad thermostat. Why is this thermostat nearly ~$100?! I think the original thermostat was stuck open as the engine never got very warm (as indicated by the dash temp guage), the heater only got moderately warm and the fan cooling the engine ran on MAX all the time and was very loud. After replacement the fan isn't running constantly the heater gets plenty hot and the in dash temp guage is reading just a tick to the left of the half way mark. If you're also flushing your radiator at this point I HIGHLY recommend finding a hose to fit the petcock drain. I tried to just use a funnel to channel the coolant down below but it still sprayed all over the place.. I'm going to try and find the right diameter tubing and will post the size later if I find it. Why in the world does this not drain downward?!

it doesn't drain downward because the cap may have not been off and was under pressure the cost of the tsat is high because it is a tstat, sensor and housing

Still referring to your excellent instructions and pictures when I change the Cruze's coolant. Thanks again!

Good to hear, please use 2CarPros anytime we are here to help. Tell a friend please.

Cheers, Ken

So based on these detailed instructions. We don't tighten the bleed screw on the radiator. We don't put the surge tank cap on, we start the vehicle and run 2500 2 minutes. No warm up time? When do we close the vent screw and tank cap? I assume it's safe as the vehicle won't get hot in those few minutes of 2,500 and idle.

when you say add Dex Cool to the surge tank to the bottom line of the bleed nozzle on the tank. Are you referring to the vent screw? If so, why did you call it 2 different names? I assume we close the vent screw/bleed nozzle at this point and fill the tank almost to the top. Close the tank and start the vehicle? Leave the tank open and start the car? Run the car at 2500 2 minutes and idle. How long does the car idle for?

Good afternoon,

You only leave the bleed screw open during filling only. If you leave it open while running, it will draw air into the system and make the system air bound.

Only open it with the engine off.

Roy

hello,

you say "Add mix of 50/50 dex-cool to surge tank to bottom line of bleed nozzle on tank. When coolant stabilizes add until coolant is at black arrow on pic"

what is the "bottom line of bleed nozzle on tank" we initially fill to and wait to stabilize? it's not the black arrow or cold fill line I assume.

It is part of the tank you are filling with coolant.

Roy