In the past I’ve always used the universal, premixed Prestone antifreeze on my older cars. My new car requires Zerex G-05 (HOAT) antifreeze which needs to be mixed w/water.
What kind of container do you all typically use for mixing antifreeze w/distilled water? I would use the 1 gallon jug that the distilled water came in but I think it’s a bad idea in general to put brightly colored, highly toxic fluids in a container that would be otherwise used for beverages (even if it resides with other chemicals in a garage).
What do people typically use? I was thinking maybe one of the small gas cans used for mixing oil/gas for two stroke engines marked up with a sharpie.
I have a two gallon jug that I use to create the 50/50 mix. Pour one gallon of pure antifreeze into the jug and then add water to fill the jug the rest of the way.
Tester
Use any convenient container, such as an empty milk jug. Just remember to label it if used for storage. Or you can simply discard it immediately after use. This ought not to be a major decision.
I use the same antifreeze jug or save an empty from before.
With only one jug I start by pouring in only half of whats needed to top off, then finish topping off with the water. ( if the car’s overflow jug is empty for example, just fill it only half way with antifreeze the the rest water and, presto ! 50/50 )
Then as my storage jug reaches halfway down, fill’er up with water…50/50 
I suppose this is a Ford product. I commend you for using the right stuff, but good luck in getting a repair shop to NOT refill it with some universal stuff and tap water if you need work that requires draining the system.
This isn’t rocket science. You only need to get a roughly 50:50 mix. You know the capacity of the system so do the calculation and dump in the volume of the coolant that you need and put in an equal amount of distilled/deionized water. Pick up an inexpensive tester to confirm it. If you are within 5%, relax. If you have very cold weather you need to pay more attention and maybe modify the concentration.
If you are flushing, you need to add a lot of pure antifreeze anyway since you can’t completely drain the block.
Where did you find the Zerex? The only store that I can find locally that stocks it is NAPA and they tend to be pricy.
Distilled water? In an engine block?? Is that like putting nitrogen in your tires? The coolant, coming in contact with hot metals, won’t be “pure” very long…This sounds like overkill to me…Are they worried about the minute amount of chlorine in tap water?
G05 is more sensitive to water quality than other coolants. That might be true for other modern coolants as well. Ford initial fills are good for 5 years or 100K. Refills are downgraded due to the fact that that shops can not be trusted to flush and refill with good water – 3 years or 50K:
A new, extended-life engine coolant, yellow-colored Motorcraft Premium Gold … The initial-fill life for this coolant is 100,000 miles/5 years. Due to variations in water quality, the replacement interval is 50,000 miles/3 years.
It follows that if you use distilled/deionized water, you can go another 5 years or 100K. I don’t know about chlorine, but I think that types and quantities of metal salts and their counter ions would be the main issue.
If it is “sensitive” that is code for it can’t handle water quality. That means it is a poor coolant. The recommend life is based on factors that you really cannot control. It might be cheaper to replace the coolant every two years. Forget distilled water. Distilled water just means that there are more ions to leach from the aluminum/iron/copper to satisfy the circulating metal ion concentration. The chemistry works in a balance of iron, copper, and aluminum ions. Calcium in water may deposit but that is what the anticorrosion factor is for. BTW I don’t flush And I have not replaced radiators, everyone is different. My water is naturally low in calcium/magnesium.
Your car REQUIRES a particular brand of anti-freeze? In this case I would tell the owner’s manual to go screw.
Why are you even worrying about the container? Throw the container away when you’re finished. Someone’s using up my oxygen…
Most tap water is probably OK, but a lot of well water has a large amount of dissolved solids. This could easily apply to tap water that comes from a community well, too. If you look at the antifreeze web sites, they tell you that their 50/50 mixtures use deionized water. If deionized (demineralized) water is OK, then distilled water is fine, too. Once it’s mixed with the antifreeze the corrosive nature of the water is eliminated.
Not a particular brand, but a particular type is recommended for best performance, G-05 formulation, Zerex and Motorcraft are most prevalent brands found. Other vehicles also use this formulation now, too.
“Performance”?
Let’s think about that. How do you measure the performance of the cooling system? You’ve gone from a “particular brand” to “a particular type”, and from “required” to “recommended”. May I suggest you consider the “go screw” option? As in put in whatever is on sale.
Manufacturers charge the same amount or more for antifreeze that needs to be mixed with water because it saves them shipping costs, thereby increasing profit. Why should they take the hit for shipping water that the customer can add?
You are overthinking and underthinking this at the same time.
"Let’s think about that. How do you measure the performance of the cooling system? You’ve gone from a “particular brand” to “a particular type”, and from “required” to “recommended”. May I suggest you consider the “go screw” option? As in put in whatever is on sale. "
I suspect coolant is rated in terms of corrosion resistance. Newer Chryslers, Fords, and Mercedes require HOAT antifreeze (just like GM require Dexcool). Outside of getting it at the dealer (I don’t know where it’s contracted from), the only off the-the-shelf equivalent is made by Valvoline (Zerex G-05) and even that can be hard to find. It’s slightly more expensive than buying the universal Prestone antifreeze but I am very hesitant about topping any fluids off with a different type.
My owner’s manual has warnings about mixing types of antifreeze–I’m probably a bit anal by thoroughly read my owner’s manuals and heed any warnings:
“Mixing of coolants other than specified Hybrid Organic Additive Technology (HOAT) engine coolants, may result in engine damage and may decrease corrosion protection. If a non-HOAT coolant is introduced into the cooling system in an emergency, it
should be replaced with the specified coolant as soon as possible.”
“Why are you even worrying about the container? Throw the container away when you’re finished. Someone’s using up my oxygen…”
I typically think it’s a bad idea to use to leave any toxic fluids in a container intended for beverages (ie, distilled water jug), especially ones that appear to be “Kool Aid” colored.
FYI (from http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/814701-overview ):
Ethylene glycol is a relatively common cause of overdose in American emergency departments. In 2007, 4966 single exposure cases were reported to the American Association of Poison Control Centers.1 Rapid intervention often makes an important difference in the outcome of ethylene glycol toxicity.
“If deionized (demineralized) water is OK, then distilled water is fine, too. Once it’s mixed with the antifreeze the corrosive nature of the water is eliminated.”
My owner’s manual recommends either. Unless it’s a scam by the manufacturer to force me to buy a $1.00 jug of water, I don’t see why they’d lie:
“Use only high purity water such as distilled or deionized water when mixing the water/engine coolant solution. The use of lower quality water will reduce the amount of corrosion protection in the engine cooling system.”
euryale1, ?If it is “sensitive” that is code for it can’t handle water quality. That means it is a poor coolant.?
Just because your engine is sensitive to the quality of motor oil that is used in it, is it a poor engine? I can control water quality more easily than motor oil quality.
The coolant is, apparently, good for three years even if marginal water is used, and I am willing to adjust the service interval upwards if I use distilled water. You are making it way too complicated.
I think that you need to separate your thinking about leaching ions in open vs. closed systems. Metal solubility is pretty limited at neutral pH in a closed system. Note that calcium is (and other carbonates are) an anticorrosion factor itself in an open system like municipal water systems. If your levels are too low, you would tend to be corrosive and after several decades, perhaps, corrode pinholes in your pipes. It is not good to be either too positive or too negative in the Langelier Saturation Index, for example, but better to be too high than low.
In automotive cooling systems, we don?t use carbonates to adjust corrosion and scaling potential. It does not work well for this application. Old-fashioned systems used silicates and phosphates to protect metal, but they don?t work as well for aluminum as they do for iron and copper. In addition, phosphates tend to precipitate with hard water and silicates polymerize. When they do that they cause abrasive erosion in the cooling system. That is why Euro car makers banned phosphates and the Japanese, OTOH, don’t like silicates.
Most coolants of today work better with aluminum and last longer. Old-fashioned green coolant does not contain as much silicate as it used to when it was state of the art, but it is still stone-hatchet technology.
Caller X, see the above. In addition, consider other measures of ?performance?. Longer service intervals mean lower costs. It means less waste as well. Performance is also measured in how long water pumps, radiators and heater cores last.