brown gunk in cooling system

[stl]

I noticed my wifes mitsibishi montero was leaking a little anti freeze. When I checked the resevoir It was filled with a brown coagulated kinda frothy substance. I have never seen anything like it. Does any one know what this is or what caused it? Thanks

 

[SS MAYFLOAT]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

Its not good news. Its an indication that you have antifreeze (coolant) in with your oil. Could be many things such as bad head gasket, cracked head or block.

My wifes Explorer did that earlier in the year. It turned out to be a bad intake maniflold gasket. Good Luck, your going to need it........SS

 

[Bob_VT]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

Don't panic yet...... Clean the system out and re-install new antifreeze. Many of the manufacturers are putting stop leak into new vehicles which is normally brown and sticky. Yeah.... it could be a blow-by leak or you just might have a slight leak.

Pressure wash the engine bay to clean any gunk off things and start looking for a leak when it is dried off.

Call the dealer and make sure it was not equipped with stop leak from the factory (GM Dex cool has stop leak in it and collects brown stuff at the tank).

If you have a cat or a dog be sure to wash away any drops of antifreeze so you do not poison them either.

Find out if your water pump has a weep hole and check that too.... designed to leak there when the water pump is going.

 

[thefairlaneman]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

In addition to the other advice I would after replacing the antifreeze perform a pressurised leak down test. Any external leaks will show up and if the problem is internal the pressure guage will show a drop. Its simple but you will need to buy or borrow the tester, They dont cost much.

 

[Ralphy]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

One more thought: if her system was filled with dex-cool (usually orange in color) and someone added glycerine based (usually green in color), they do not mix and will result in a cogealed mess like you are talking about. If this is the case you will need to do a major flush of the radiator system.

 

[stl]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

My wife said the last time she had her oil changed. The guy said that the antifreeze was low so he topped it off. Maybe he used the wrong stuff. Thanks for the info so far.

 

[PierBridge]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

My wife said the last time she had her oil changed. The guy said that the antifreeze was low so he topped it off. Maybe he used the wrong stuff. Thanks for the info so far.

Nope!

Like stated above and in order of prefference your looking at an upper intake "hopefully" followed by a lower intake "worse" followed by an head gasket "real Bad" problem.

good Luck

 

[JCF350]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

I noticed my wifes mitsibishi montero was leaking a little anti freeze.

Where is the leak?

When I checked the resevoir It was filled with a brown coagulated kinda frothy substance. I have never seen anything like it. Does any one know what this is or what caused it? Thanks

Some asian cars use a brown colored antifreeze. Could just be old or the wrong kind was added to it.

Antifreeze ain't just antifreeze any more these days, you gotta put in the right stuff because all manufacturers are formulating different kinds.

Last time I checked there were 12 different kinds of green
orange
burnt orange colored, used by Chrysler
brown
red
blue green
pink

Some require demineralized water others need just plain tap water


And there ain't no such thing as universal!! even though there is some out there that claims to be.

Will it mess it up right away? no but it'll dang sure will down the road.

Late model cars are not for Destroy It Yourselfers these days.

 

[ezmobee]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

My 2000 Buick Regal has had gunk in the cooling system since I got it with 65k miles on it. I'm now at 127k with no problems. I have flushed the system twice. It may be an indicator of a larger problem but like I said, it's been this way at least half it's life.

 

[j442w30]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

My 2000 Buick Regal has had gunk in the cooling system since I got it with 65k miles on it. I'm now at 127k with no problems. I have flushed the system twice. It may be an indicator of a larger problem but like I said, it's been this way at least half it's life.

Same here, my brother has a 1998 Oldsmobile Intrigue and there was brown gunk all around the radiator cap when I flushed it out this summer. The car has 170,000 on it and she runs alright considering what its been through. I'm pretty sure it has a slight head gasket leak but I'm not too worried about it.

 

[EJ3]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

A relative of mine just this past weekend needed to add coolant to her VW Jetta. She topped off the radiator with antifreeze THEN read the owners manual. It said to use only VW brand coolant. And if another coolant was used, to replace all the fluid with VW coolant ASAP. The manual explained further that if the fluid turned to a brown color, the antifreeze that was added was not one that was mixable with the current fluid.

Check your owners manual and see if it gives you any good advice.

Not sure it will, but I hope this helps you a little!

 

[dchris]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

Is it brown liquid or does it look like pancake batter? If it's batter, you probably have a blown head gasket. I bought 6 months with an old dodge by adding metlic sealer to the anitifreeze. If the head gasket is blown, it wont last long.

 

[2broke4this]

Re: brown gunk in cooling system

Here is another thought... the transmission cooler in the radiator in a van I used to have leaked transmission fluid into the antifreeze, causing a decent mess. It wasn't terribly frothy, but it turned the green fluid a lovely shade of brown. Good luck with it, whatever your problem is!