Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Caprice Radiator Replaced

Yesterday was my first ever non-trivial car repair. I'm very happy to say that it went off very smoothly. I'm also happy to say that I finally got to use my Craftsman tool set on an automotive project! Everything went wonderfully.

For starters, here's a picture of the leak in the radiator. You can see where the coolant has been leaking out onto surrounding parts. It's the red/rust colored stuff.



First step was to disconnect a bunch of stuff, and drain the coolant out of the radiator.



Here, the radiator has been removed.



Comparison shot between the old radiator and the new one. They are SLIGHTLY different, and different in ways that sort of matter. The new radiator doesn't fit quite right into the car, but I don't care. The reason I don't care is because all of the housing around the radiator will be stripped off for the MattMobile, and won't matter in the final build. Right now, my focus is on fixing the overheating problem.



Lastly, here's the new radiator installed.



As mentioned, I'm sad that this did not fix the problem. I've still got a few things to check before I'm at my wits end. I'm going to replace the thermostat next. Then the water pump. All of that can be done for about 60 bucks, so that's cool.

2 comments:

nullset said...

Make sure the fans work before you replace the thermostat. Have you seen them spin at all yet?

Greg323i said...

I know this is two years old, and it may have been mentioned elsewhere, but because it's a police car things will be different. You should specify "police package" to your parts guys.