Recieved a bottle of coolant additive in the mail...do I use it?

[H0USE]

Ford gave me a auto--save warranty extension on my truck for 175,000 miles/ 5 more years, only stipulation is I need documented oil changes every 4k miles. Anyways they sent me a bottle of coolant additive that I must add in order to maintain the warranty. Should I pour it in or is it snake oil? Would they know if I used it or not,

thanks

[allevil]

Auto Save warranty is a JOKE!

I had a Used Car Dealer give it to me. I had TONS of receipt for my Scheduled maintenance, they kept saying they would have to send an Independent Inspector in to check my Transmission when I tried to make a Claim. This was a couple years later too, not like I just got the warranty then tried to claim.

Anyway, the Dealer ended up taking care of me.

Words of Wisdom, I'd say NO to them. I don't think the warranty is worth the paper it is printed on.

[stroken04]

The additive is used to prevent cavitation.
Cavitation is a phenomenon that occurs in diesel engines,
it will cause a hole in your cylinder wall.

I think coolant that is formulated for diesel engines already has anti-cavitation additives in it.

[stroken04]

Here is a little more indepth look at cavitation:

What is cavitation?
One of our diesel experts offered this explanation:
Cavitation is a localized low pressure zone that forms adjacent to the outer wall of the cylinder. It is caused by by the flexing of the cylinder wall due to the high cylinder pressures experienced in diesel engine ignition. Gasoline engines don't typically get this failure mode due to lower cylinder pressures during ignition. Basically what happens is the cylinder wall quickly expands due to ignition then returns to its original geometry. This expansion of the cylinder wall is more pronounced as you increase the demand for power. Bascially when you increase your demand for power you are pumping more fuel into the cylinder. If you have a turbo charged unit you are also increasing air charge. This increase in fuel and air causes a more violent ignition which further increases cylinder pressures and thus increases the flexing of the cylinder wall. This fast cylinder wall movement causes a low pressure zone to be created in the coolant adjacent to the cylinder wall. When this pressure zone drops below the vapor pressure point (temperature, coolant ratio, and additive dependant) a vapor bubble is formed. When this low pressure zone returns to a high pressure zone, the vapor bubble collapses, causing an implosion, or pitting phenomena on the cylinder wall (like hitting the surface with a microscopic ball peen hammer). If left unchecked, it will eventually eat all the way through the cylinder wall.


What do I do to prevent cavitation?
The answer is simple, add the appropriate coolant additive at 15,000 mile intervals and perform a complete coolant change every 30,000. By following these procedures, you'll never have a coolant-related failure. The additives include Ford's FW-16 (replacement for the older FW-15), Fleetguard's DCA4, Penray's Pencool, and others. A new alternative is to use Cat and Fleetguard's new extended life coolant. It is impregnated with the proper additive and mixed to the proper antifreeze/water combination at the factory. You simply pour it in.

How does it work?
In conventional coolant the additive called SCA or Supplemental Coolant Additive adds a sacrificial layer to the cylinder wall so that the cavitation action will act against it instead of against the metal cylinder wall. Keeping additive levels maintained will keep this sacrificial layer in optimum condition.
In extended life coolants the carboxylate molecule is a long chained molecule and it is in constant flux of being attached and detached to the cylinder wall. This action and length of the carboxylate molecule absorbs the cavitation action and does not allow the metal of the cylinder wall to be impacted.

[2008TTCC]

Ok HOUSE... You made THREE (3) BRAND NEW threads in 10 minutes. Please try to condense all of your questions into one post. It makes it easier for everyone to answer your questions.