Ariel.Club Forum

Hi,

Anyone know what the factory coolant is? Mine was orange-ish originally but I’m not sure what type is used from the factory or if it’s a Honda premix etc

Appreciate any pointers!

Cheers.

Not sure these days as the original manufacturers products have changed ..

Some time back, the factory coolant in the tank was a bright pink and I believe was known as Valvoline Red.

Here's a car at the factory (2011) in build :-
Looking at the Valvoline website today, their recommenfded product for Honda is the Asian Blue?

Others have suggested that Honda Type 2 is the one to use.

It needs about 12 litres to completely fill .

Don't assume it's an easy job to drain/refill !
It's really difficult getting all the air out, without which you'll get no flow and an air lock.
The factory have said in the past that it can take an hour and a half to clear, with the engine running and the car jacked up at a crazy angle at the front.

Do a search on here for some stories and techniques.

Hi John,

Thank you for the detailed information as always. I completely forgot to ask about the capacity too, 12 litres seems like a fair amount!

I’m a bit worried about the process of bleeding the cooling system and remember hearing that it wasn’t a very straightforward job.....

I have a new radiator coming to help keep the engine temperature down during the summer so an hour and a half is no problem for “operation something to do in winter” (the car is off-road now).... I just hope I don’t need to swing the frame from the ceiling or anything too crazy to get the air out!

I wonder if the atom4 is any easier to work on generally or if it’s just an “Ariel thing™ ?”

Cheers

I have done it on a 2 and 3 and it takes a while but not too difficult.

The trick I found was to raise the front of the car up as far as you can. This puts the radiator bleed valve closer to the height of the expansion tank.

Open the radiator bleed valve and fill the expansion tank until it comes out of the radiator valve. When you cannot get anymore in, put the cap on the expansion tank and see if you can get anymore in by back fillling from the radiator bleed valve. This should leave minimal air in the system.

Run the car with the expansion cap off and it should purge the air out. Once it stops "burping" air out and the car is getting warm then put the cap on. Keep any eye on the temperature gauge and monitor the 2 pipes underneath as they should both get hot once the thermostat opens and water circulates.

Final step is to purge any air that may have accumulated in the radiator via the bleed valve once it has cooled down.

Hope this helps.

[mention]stupot[/mention] Thanks for the info and pointers, I'll follow your method and keep checking for air in the system afterwards.

Annoyingly, I can't get the Valvoline red locally just the regular version so I'm not sure if it's better to try and rinse out what's there with distilled water (would be very difficult given my garage setup) and go with that, or see if it can be mixed with the regular one?!

I know mixing types of coolant is generally a bad idea but don't know what the difference between the Red and regular is....?!

Cheers!