How do I tell which coolant is in there now?

[code.mafia]

Ok, I feel stupid for asking this question, but this truck has had a coolant leak, I believe a cracked degas bottle that only presents itself when I'm towing, which is VERY rare. I didn't discover this until I was on a long trip, towing a truck and trailer behind me in 104 degree weather through very steep hilly terrain. The truck still has the EGR cooler and the deltas are almost always within 5* and we've had numerous 114-115 degree days here recently. I was stranded on the road with the truck overheating. My only solution at the time was to put water in it to get me down the road. The problem is that I need to add some coolant and I don't know for sure what kind it's had in it up to this point. Is there a way to tell for sure? The coolant doesn't have much color to it, I can't tell what color it is. It's definitely not red. So should I just add some gold to it until I do the flush and EGR cooler delete and oil cooler replacement later?

[lenzhotrod]

Color is the only way I know of, off the top of my head. Still won't tell the strength of it. Also no such thing as a stupid question,only stupid mistakes!!!

[SharkDiver]

Put whatever you want in it for now and when you get home do a complete flush and put in some good elc coolant and be done with it. If your deltas are good now you could just drain it and fill with elc instead of flushing it and possibly clogging your cooler.

[code.mafia]

I thought you couldn't put in ELC unless you had used Restore/Restore+ to clean the other stuff out or it makes the ELC ineffective?

Yes my deltas have always been very good.

[jp45601]

I cant speak for everybody, but what I did was flush with restore. That got rid of the gunk in the engine. I did not use Restore +, That breaks up the rust in the engine. I didn't have no problems with my delta's before or after the flush & fill.

[code.mafia]

Originally Posted by jp45601

I cant speak for everybody, but what I did was flush with restore. That got rid of the gunk in the engine. I did not use Restore +, That breaks up the rust in the engine. I didn't have no problems with my delta's before or after the flush & fill.

I'd like to know more about this. Ever since I put the gold coolant in it, my oil temps are much higher...shoulda just left straight water in it until I did the flush and oil cooler swap and egr delete. I've been driving a lot longer distances also, across very steep hilly country like Missouri. I'm leaving town in a week and won't be back for a couple of months, away from my tools, so I think I want to try this half-flush to hopefully clean out the oil cooler and get the right coolant in it so I don't have to worry about it while I'm out of town.

So you drained all the coolant, put a gallon of Restore in it, topped off with distilled water, ran it for x amount of time, then drained, filled with distilled water, ran it, drained, repeat. How many gallons of distilled water did you use? How long did you let it run after each refill before draining it? I have the high idle mod in place.