Wondering how many shops use distilled water for coolant changes.
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Tester is right, unless you remove the drain plugs in the block, you don’t get all the coolant (or water after you flush it). This is why I don’t like 50/50 coolant. The Pink extra long life coolant for my car is not available in anything except 50/50.Toyota says it is good for 10 years at the factory fill but only 5 years after you change it.
Next summer I will drain what I can flush it with a garden hose and add the correct amount of a full strength coolant and fill the rest with water. I will then mix up a 50/50 mix for the remote reservoir and for topping off.
I have never used anything but tap water. I think it depends on the quality of your water.
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I have a Toyota and change my own coolant also. I always assumed that Toyota assumed you wouldn’t get 100% of the old coolant out, hence the 5 year change recommendation after you do a drain and fill. If it was good for the first ten years, I can’t see any reason it wouldn’t be good for ten years again if you could totally flush the system and get 100% new coolant in there?
I did a drain and fill on our 2013 at 100k miles. A little early going by years, but obviously 100% of the coolant wasn’t replaced by just removing the bottom radiator hose. I’ll do it again in 2023 or so. Then every 5 years. It’ll never all be new coolant in there, but it’ll never be all old coolant either. I figure it’ll work out well enough.
I think it depends on where you live. Tap water near me has low dissolved solids, and should not be significantly different from distilled water. Well water would be a different story.
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