mayo in radiator hg or not?

[krisjones91]

when i bought the car it had mayo in the rad. but it was cheap and it seemed to hold its temp okay and ran like a dream. now over three months later and wuite a few thousand miles later iv still got mayo in the radiator and the temp is still spot on. iv had no issues with the engine and it drives fine.
my question is am i just lucky its not gone bang or is it just a leaky water jacket and because iv not seen any water in the oil its not an issue? i know the 1.4 gaskets are made of cheese and there prone to going but should i be worrying or not?
thanks

[John1.4]

best bet is to flush out the cooling system with a good rad cleaner, fill it back up with coolant, then see if it comes back, a weak headgasket won't really affect the running of your engine until it starts using up water/overheating or ruining you oil/your bearings by which point it's time to get out the spanners/your wallet...lol
if it doesn't come back then i wouldn't worry, if it does just change the HG

[306Dan]

As above flush the system out and see if it returns, if your still worried do a compression check on all 4 cylinders.
I had mayo in my rad for 5 years before I bothered to check it out

[pugjohn306]

Yep flush out rad best thing to do is at the bottom right hand of rad as your standing towards it theres a drain plug take it off drain the water stick a hose in the water bottle and turn it on this will push any crap out dont use rad cleanners there all crap like i said put hose in bottle bung it up and leave the drain plug off and turn on water this will flush it through remember once youv flushed and filled back up you may have to burp it

[krisjones91]

wicked thanks for the info guys. il do it on the weekend. a garage told me once when i had the same symptoms in my saxo to put a capful of washing up liquid in the rad and run it around for a little while. apparently it gets all the oily crud off the gubbins of it. never tried it tho. have any of you heard of that. im weary as wouldnt it cause little bubbles which means air in system? il defo do the hose thing tho.

[bigtone0777]

I've never heard of using washing up liquid bit I'd def get the hose on it and run it about a while and see if it comes back. Could be from a previous problem and no ones bothered cleaning up or worst case you might have to do the hg. I would have thought it'll be ok if your water level isn't dropping at all

[krisjones91]

no lies the garage guy said a cap of washing up liquid to loosen it up then flush it. i was dubious lol. im not loosing water or oil or having any temp issues, but i do have massive clumpy white segments in the rad and you can see the rainbow colours in the rad water. like you said maybe a previous job. il flush it and see what happens.

[bigtone0777]

Let us know how you get on after a flush

[daddyfixit]

f its got mayonnaise in the coolant then the gasket has failed.

also using a handful of soap powder in the system to act as a flushing agent does work; I cleared out a 206 that I had done a h/g on as the owner had blocked the heater matrix with the emulsified oil, as she drove it even after being told the h/g had gone. drain & refill about half a dozen times using hot water and the soap powder does break down the mayonnaise. using a hosepipe on a tap also blasted all the gunge out of the matrix by pointing the hosepipe onto one of the heater matrix pipes.

[bigtone0777]

If the head gasket was gone it would be loosing coolant to cause the emulsification however the op has said that the coolant level is constant which would suggest the head gasket has been replaced but the cooling system not flushed

[krisjones91]

yeah its not loosing any coolant, but its got a mayo in the rad defo and oily looking water,tho in the 3 months iv owned it has not got any worse and is running sweet so i will flush it and fingers crossed it was just a lazy hg change and with no rad flush.
there ya go what the garage said was true then about the washing up liquid lol.
how do i burp the system once iv done a flush and change. is it simply letting the engine tick over with the cap off so it pushes the bubbles out? cheers.

[306Dan]

you'll need to open the bleed screws, theres one on the heater matrix where the two pipes enter on the bulk head, one on the thermostat housing ( a small 4mm allen bolt) and one on top of the rad

[krisjones91]

wicked thanks dan, iv got a haynes so il be able to locate them. iv seen what i thought was a bleeder on the heater matrix pipes.

[Bender]

If you were losing coolant you could have white smoke out the exhaust at startup. Do a compression test and you will know then if its gone, coolant test will show as well at a better garage.

You should use a proper flush fluid for a few weeks to make sure you get all the oil out as soon as you know gasket hasn't gone. The rad can be blocked too depends on how bad oil leaks went etc.

These engines do tend to have mayo anyways after a while, check all the oil breather pipes are clear too.