Coolant filter - suprising results

[niftytwofifty]

After reading how terrible the ford coolant is, and noticing some sand in the degas bottle, I installed a coolant filter on my 06 F250.

I drove over 1,000 miles and changed the filter. The 1000 miles was a mix of city driving, hard accelerating and cruising at 80 mph on the highway on a 8 hour road trip.

I cut open the used filter and found very little particles in the filter. The sand in the degas bottle has not moved, its pretty much stuck to the bottom. I could take the degas bottle off and clean it, but I was still expecting more "crap" in the coolant filter.

I drive about 30,000 miles a year and i drive it hard, coolant flush happened about 35,000 miles ago.

I guess what are your thoughts? Shouldn't the coolant filter be catching a pile of sand? I have seen other threads where the coolant filter looked like a sand box when cut open.

[screwatts]

I'd say the prior flush may have something to do with it.

[jd4010]

I've thoroughly flushed my cooling system twice and have been running a coolant filter for the past 20+k miles. To be honest, when I cut mine open (out of curiosity), I see very little too.

I believe that once you do the flushing and run a coolant filter for a period of time that eventually the casting sand is reduced time after time to the point that it's very little or appears non-existent. Which is good....it's what you are striving for!

As for your degas bottle, personally, I'd remove and clean it, change your filter and be on your way not to worry about it.

[wngnt954]

I have done two coolant flushes, ten thousand miles apart. The first time I got a couple of teaspoons of sand out of my coolant filter. This last time I did the reverse flush and got a lot more in the filter and alot showed up during the reverse flushing. My deltas are the best they have ever been.


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[SharkDiver]

1000 miles isnt much.. I thought you should run the first filter for 5k miles then 15k-20k or maybe 30k after that, I cant remember.

[southend]

Originally Posted by SharkDiver

1000 miles isnt much.. I thought you should run the first filter for 5k miles then 15k-20k or maybe 30k after that, I cant remember.

He was curious..........thats why he cut it open so soon.

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[dee004]

Each engine is different. My first filter plugged after just 500 miles and already had two flushes before it was installed. Sounds like your pretty lucky with regards to residual casting sand being released in the cooling system.

[Lilpooh]

Make sure it's casting sand, stick a magnet in the Degas bottle, it the debris sticks, then it's iron scale.

[PGreenSVT]

except for the new IPR full flow coolant filter the typical bypass really takes quite a while to do its job.

[WarChild]

you should run it for at least 5000 miles before checking but if you never ran it before then all the crap is probably already in the cooler. If its there already only way to get it out without replacing the oil cooler is to do a back flush.